ERKELEY     \  | 

IBRARY      1  ' 

^^IVERSITY   OF      f 
CALIFORNIA      /' 


'I 


TOLSTOY 


MASTER    SPIRITS 
OF    LITERATURE 

EDITED   BY 

GEORGE    RAPALL   NOYES 

AND 

WALTER   MORRIS    HART 


•*A  good  book  is  the  precious  life-blood  of  a  Master  Spirit, 
embalmed  and  treasured  up  on  purpose  to  a  life  beyond 
life." — Milton,  Areopagitica, 


VOLUMES    IN    THE    SERIES 

DANTE. 

By  Charles  Hall  Grandgent,  Professor  of 
Romance  Languages  in  Harvard  University. 

TOLSTOY. 

By  George  Rapall  Notes,  Associate  Pro- 
fessor of  Slavic  Languages  in  the  University 
of  California. 

CERVANTES. 

By  Rudolph  Schevill,  Professor  of  Spanish  in 
the  University  of  California.     (In  preparation.) 

SHAKESPEARE. 

By  Raymond  Macdonald  Alden,  Professor 
of  English  in  Stanford  University.  {In  prep- 
aration.) 

VIRGIL. 

By  H.  W.  Prescott,  Professor  of  Classical 
Philology  in  the  University  of  Chicago.  {In 
preparation.) 

HOMER. 

By  Paul  Shorey,  Professor  of  Greek  in  the 
University  of  Chicago. 

MOLlfiRE. 

By  Curtis  Hidden  Page,  Professor  of  Eng- 
lish in  Dartmouth  College. 

GOETHE.     {To  he  arranged.) 


MASTER   SPIRITS  OF  LITERATURE 

TOLSTOY 


v<» 


BY 

GEORGE  RAPALL  NOYES 


NEW   YORK 
DUPFIELD    &   COMPANY 

1918 


Copyright,  1918,  by 
DUFFIELD  &  COMPANY 


?G  33SS 

M7 


UNOFRGRAO. 
LIBRARY 


CONTENTS 


PAGB 

Preface       xiii 

Chapter  I.  Introduction. — ^Tolstoy's  fame.  Tolstoy  a  typical 
Russian.  His  ancestry.  Life  of  the  Russian  nobility.  Tol- 
stoy's temperament.  Education.  Military  service  in  the 
Caucasus.  Aspirations}  fo'*  R^^lf-pprf^f'tinn.  Attitude  towards 
religion.  Reading.  Influence  of  Rousseau.  Tolstoy's  lack 
of  the  literary  temperament 3 

Chapter  II.  Early  Works. — Publication  of  Childhood.  Literary 
qualities  of  Childhood,  Boyhood,  and  Youth.  Its  autobio- 
graphic nature.  Genius  for  observation.  /Description  of 
nature  and  of  men  and  women.J  ^nalysis  of  character.  " 
Possible  influence  of  , Rousseau,  Sincerity.  JPreoccupation 
with  moral  problems.^)A.bsence  of  interest  in  religious  doggras. 
^ombertonsr'  Emphasis  on  vanity.  Democratic  sympathies. 
High  seriousness. — ^Tolstoy's  service  in  the  Crimean  war. 
His  Sevastopol.  Picture  of  war  as  suffering  _and  death. 
Analysis  of  minor  feelings.,  Officers  and  common  soldiers. 
—  Tolstoy's  hero  the  truth.  (Emphasis  on  individual  feeling. 
Interest  in  religion.  Tolstoy's  originality.  His  influence. — 
The  CossacJcs.  Contrast  with  Pushkin.  Attitude  towards 
nature.      Maryana 24 

Chapter  III.  Life  and  Work:  1855-62. — Political  life  In  Russia 
after  the  Crimean  war.  Official  Nationalists,  Liberals,  So- 
cialists, Slavophiles.  Tolstoy's  attitude  towards  each  party. 
His  association  with  the  Contemporary.  The  social  importance 
of  Russian  literature.  Tolstoy's  account  of  the  Contemporary 
group. — ^Love  affair.  /Family  Happiness^  Trip  abroad, 
1857.  Witnesses  execution  in  Paris.  The  Countess  Alexandra 
Tolstoy.    Lucerne.    Albert.    Return  to  Russia.    Three  Deaths. 


CONTENTS 

PAQH 

Becomes  a  member  of  the  Society  of  Lovers  of  Russian  Litera- 
ture in  Moscow.  Life  on  home  estate.  Bear  hunt.  Pause  in 
literary  work.  Trip  abroad,  1860-61.  Study  of  popular 
education.  Death  of  Tolstoy's  brother  Nikolay.  Polikushka. 
Tolstoy  and  Turgenev.  Their  quarrel.  Tolstoy  and  the 
emancipation  of  the  serfs.  His  work  as  arbiter  of  the  peace. 
Search  of  his  premises  by  the  police.  Marriage  to  Sophia 
Behrs .54 

Chapter  IV.  Tolstoy  as  an  Educator. — ^Tolstoy's  enthusiasm 
for  popular  education  and  work  on  it.  List  of  his  educational 
writings.  His  doctrines.  Modern  education  is  bad  in  being 
based  on  compulsion.  There  is  no  general  agreement  as  to  the 
aims  and  methods  of  education.  Progress  b  a  false  criterion 
of  education.  Evils  of  compulsory  education  and  benefits  of 
free  education.  Freedom  is  the  only  criterion  of  a  school  pro- 
gram, experience  the  only  test  of  methods  of  teaching. 
Arousing  interest  is  the  only  important  principle  of  pedagogy. 
Methods  of  teaching  reading.  Tolstoy's  definition  of  educa- 
tion, i  Education  should  bring  about  equality _of  knowledge, 
but  must  not  interfere  with  human  character.  '  False,  social 
aims  of  education.  Critique  of  a  government  project  for 
popular  schools.  Tolstoy's  description  of  his  own  school. 
Tribute  by  one  of  his  pupils.  Teaching  of  grammar.  Of 
composition.  Tolstoy's  tribute  to  a  pupil.  Teaching  of 
literature.  Work  on  text-books.  Little  Philip.  Teaching  of 
art.  The  standards  of  the  common  people  superior  to  those 
of  the  educated.  Influence  of  Rousseau  on  Tolstoy's  views  of 
education.  Tolstoy's  individualism  in  education.  Critique 
of  his  abhorrence  of  compulsion  in  education  and  of  his 
rejection  of  the  Liberals'  ideal  of  progress.  Tolstoy  and  the 
Slavophiles.  His  individualism  is  combined  with  an  ideal  of 
service 87 

Chapter  V.  Life:  1862-78. — ^Tolstoy *s  happy  married  life. 
Linen-Measurer.  Work  on  War  and  Peace.  Tolstoy's  habits 
of  work.  His  farming.  He  defends  a  soldier  before  a  court. 
Home  life  in  the  Tolstoy  household^  Aunt  Tatyana.  En- 
tfiiisiasnrfor  Schopenhauer.  Study  of  Greek.  Trip  to  the 
province  of  Samara.  Buys  estate  there.  Work  on  relief  of 
famine  there,  1873.  Attitude  towards  religion.  Indignation 
at  being  put  under  arrest.     Plan  for  settling  in  England. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Preparations  for  novel  on  the  times  of  Peter  the  Great. 
Anna  Karenin.  The  Decembrists.  Tolstoy's  friends,  Fet 
and  Strakhov.  Acquaintance  with  Chaykovsky.  Reconcilia- 
tion with  Turgenev 128 

Chapter  VI.  "War  and  Peace'*  and  "Anna  Karenin."— ^Tol- 
stoy's fame  as  a  novelist  rests  on  these  two  books.  Unconven- 
tional character  of  War  and  Peace.  Its  superficial  lack  of  unity. 
Different  elements  in  it.  (1)  Home  life.  Natasha  Rostov. 
Nikoldy  Rostov.  Sonya.  Prince  Nikolay  Bolkonsky.  The 
Kuragins.  (2)  Picture  of  military  life.  Absence  of  heroes. 
Impotence  of  Napoleon. »' Contrast  of  Tolstoy  with  Sir  Walter 
Scott,  (a^hilosophy  of  History.  Fatalism.  Free  will  and 
determinism.  Lack  of  real  historic  interest  in  Tolstoy.  (4) 
Views  on  personal  conduct.  Prince  Andrey  Bolkonsky. 
Pierre  Bezukhov.  Platon  Karatayev. — Anna  Karenin. 
Moral  point  of  view  more  dominating.  Greater  unity  than  in 
War  and  Peace.  Apparent  waste  of  good  material.  Uncon- 
ventional traits  in  novel.  Its  living  character.  Lack  of 
eloquent  conversation.  Tolstoy's  emphasis  on  the  spiritual 
life.  His  changed  view  of  war.  His  attitude  towards  his 
characters.  Meaning  of  the  motto  of  the  novel.  Levin  as  a 
reproduction  of  Tolstoy.    Anna  and  Levin 158 

Chapter  VII.    The  Crisis;  the  Religious  System. — ^Tolstoy's 
autobiography  in  My  Confession.    His  education  in  the  faith 
of  the  Russian  Orthodox  Church.     Early  loss  of  religious 
faith.    Faith  in  self-perfection.    Tbe^uestion  Q£.,the  meaning  \ 
oflife^  This  is  solved,  not  by  scientists  or  philosophers  or  \ 
men  of  education,  but  by  the  toiling  masses  of  humanity .ljI 
Tolstoy's  return  to  the  churcli  o{  the  Russian  peasants.    The 
hypocrisy  and  the  immoral  teaching  of  this  church.    Tolstoy 
leaves  it,  and  seeks  to  discover  the  central  teachings  of 
Christianity.    Analysis  of  the  causes  of  Tolstoy's  conversion. 
His  interest  is  in  practical  ethics,  not  in  theology.    Tolstoy's 
first  religious  works.     Critique  of  Dramatic  Theology.    Har- 
mony and   Translation  of  the  Four  Gospels.     My  Religion. 
Tolstoy's  tlieology:   God,  eternal  life,  feejection  of  temporal 
immortalit^jOn  Life.    Later  return  to  faith  in  immortality. 

[Tolstoy's  ethics. 4  The  five  commandments.  Christian 
anarchy.     Criticism  of  Tolstoy's  use  of  the  Gospels,  jpia- 

ytinguishing  traits  of  Tolstoy's  ethical  system:  individualism^j 


CONTENTS 

-T" PAGE 

I   dislike  of  civilization,  pessimism,  asceticism,  love.     Formal 
I   classification  of  Tolstoy's  ethical  system 205 

Chapter  VIII.  Life:  1878-1910. — Gloom  resulting  from  re- 
ligious conversion.  Letter  to  Alexander  III.  Tolstoy  re- 
fuses to  serve  on  a  jury.  The  stumbling-block  of  property. 
Efforts  at  compromise.  Tolstoy  makes  his  property  over  to 
his  family.  Struggles  between  family  affection  and  religious 
principle.  And  the  Light  Shineth  in  Darkness.  Life  in 
Moscow.  City  poverty.  Syutayev.  What  Shall  We  Do  Then? 
Influence  of  sociali^ic  thought  on  Tolstoy.  /Critique  of 
Tolstoy's  socraTtlieorie^  His  own  efforts  to  apply  them. 
Hoiiqe  Ji£^  Worik  on  famine  relief,  1891-93.  Visits  to 
Optin  Monastery.  Tolstoy's  new  associates,  Chertk6v  and 
Biryukov.  Work  on  literature  for  the  common  people.  The 
Dukhobors.  Writing  of  Resurrection.  Tolstoy's  letters  to 
Verigin.  The  single-tax  system.  Sympathy  for  Liberals  and 
Socialists.  Attempt  to  confine  Tolstoy  in  a  monastery.  The 
Synod  proclaims  him  a  heretic.  His  reply.  The  Kingdom 
of  God  Is  Within  You.  Views  on  patriotism.  Later  religious 
works.  Course  of  Reading.  Tolstoy's  never-ending  youth. 
Advice  to  a  vagrant 255 

Chapter  IX.  Later  Artistic  Works;  "What  is  Art"? — Rela- 
tions with  Turgenev.  Turgenev's  last  letter  to  Tolstoy.  Tol- 
stoy's projected  speech  in  honor  of  Turgenev.  Moral  tales. 
Later  realistic  work.  The  Death  of  Ivdn  Ilyich.  Master  and 
Man.  The  Power  of  Darkness.  Condemnation  of  women.  The 
Kreuizer  Sonata.  Tolstoy  on  the  sex  instinct.  Father  Sergy. 
The  Devil.  The  Fruits  of  Enlightenment.  Resurrection. 
Correspondence  with  Bellows.  The  Living  Corpse.  Hadji 
Murad. — What  is  Art?  Beauty  not  a  necessary  element  of  art. 
Art  defined  as  the  conscious  transfer  of  emotion.  The  religious 
character  of  art  in  the  narrower  sense.  This  lost  in  modern 
times.  Condemnation  of  modern  esthetic  theories.  Sound- 
ness of  Tolstoy's  principle.  The  impoverishment  of  modern 
art.  Its  obscurity.  Its  insincerity.  Its  methods  of  com- 
pensating for  its  insincerity.  True  art  is  distinguished  by 
its  infectiousness.  In  our  time  true  art  must  be  Christian 
art.  Summary  of  Tolstoy's  esthetic  system.  Its  validity  de- 
pends on  that  of  his  ethics.     Its  permanent  value.     Its 


CONTENTS 

connection  with  his  own  practice. — Preface  to  the  Works  of 
Guy  de  Maupassant.    On  Shakespeare  and  the  Drama.     .     .     .  302 

Chapter  X.  Conclusion. — Tolstoy's  departure  from  home. 
His  death. — Is  Tolstoy^  a  Master  Spirit  of  Literature?  His 
position  in  Russia.  His  universaT'fame"  Tolstoy  a  master 
of  realism.  His  importance  as  a  writer  on  religion  and  morals. 
His  union  of  the  esthetic  and  the  moralistic  viewsljrTIJfe. 
Hfg'personality.    The  ant  brothers.    The  green  stick.    .    .    .  355 

Bibliography 367 

Index 373 


PREFACE 

The  purpose  of  this  book  is  to  give  a  connected  view 
of  Tolstoy's  many-sided  literary  work,  with  such  facts 
as  to  his  life  as  may  serve  to  shed  light  on  that  work 
and  on  the  personality  of  the  man  who  produced  it.  The 
book  does  not  attempt  to  chronicle  in  detail  the  events  of 
Tolstoy's  life,  or  to  fm*nish  information  as  to  each  of  his 
minor  bits  of  writing;  it  avoids  digressions  on  the  mem- 
bers of  his  family  and  other  persons  associated  with  him. 

The  materials  for  the  volume  are  primarily  Tolstoy's 
published  writings,  letters,  and  diaries.  In  particular, 
I  have  made  much  use  of  his  correspondence  with  the 
Countess  Alexandra  Andr^yevna  Tolstoy,  and  of  his 
letters  to  his  wife,  both  of  which  books  have  appeared 
in  print  since  the  hves  of  Tolstoy  by  Biryuk6v,  Maude, 
Dole,  and  RoUand.  For  the  events  of  Tolstoy's  life  I 
have  relied  mainly  on  Biryuk6v  and,  for  his  later  years, 
on  Maude.  Despite  the  fact  that  I  have  been  at  work 
on  this  volume,  at  irregular  intervals,  for  a  dozen  years, 
I  cannot  profess  to  have  made  use  of  all  the  accessible 
materials.  Most  important,  the  diary  of  Tolstoy's 
early  years,  1847-52,  reached  me  too  late  to  be  of 
service.  I  do  not  think,  however,  that  the  materials 
with  which  I  am  unacquainted  would  modify  my  opin- 


PREFACE 

ions  on  any  vital  questions.  The  main  course  of  Tol- 
stoy's life,  and  the  development  of  his  artistic  genius 
and  of  his  thought,  are  clear  and  plain;  new  reading 
supplies  for  the  most  part  only  fresh  illustrations  of 
what  was  already  known. 

The  system  of  transliterating  Russian  names  that  I 
have  adopted  is,  with  very  small  variations,  that  recom- 
mended for  "popular"  use  by  the  School  of  Russian 
Studies  in  the  University  of  Liverpool.  The  accent 
of  Russian  names  is  most  frequently,  though  by  no 
means  regularly,  on  the  next  to  the  last  syllable;  it 
has  been  indicated  in  this  book  whenever  it  does  not 
fall  on  that  syllable.  In  this  matter  I  have  followed  the 
excellent  precedent  set  by  Mr.  Dole.  The  name  Tol- 
stoy, however,  has  been  left  unmarked:  in  Russian  it 
is  accented  on  the  last  syllable;  whether  it  should  be 
so  accented  in  English  is  a  question  of  taste. 

The  translations  from  Tolstoy  and  other  Russian 
writers  given  in  the  text  are  my  own,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  occasional  passages  of  which  the  Russian  originals 
were  not  accessible  to  me.  In  these  cases  the  source  of 
the  translation  is  duly  indicated. 

Dates  are  given  in  new  style,  that  used  in  all  English- 
speaking  countries.  For  the  nineteenth  century  this  is 
twelve  days  and  for  the  twentieth  thirteen  days  in  ad- 
vance of  the  Russian  calendar.  Thus,  August  28  (Rus- 
sian style),  the  birthday  of  Tolstoy,  corresponds  to 
September  9  (new  style)  in  the  nineteenth  century  and 
to  September  10  in  the  twentieth. 


PRJEFACB 

My  work  has  been  made  far  easier  by  the  use  of  Pro- 
fessor Wiener's  wonderfully  complete  and  accurate 
translation  of  Tolstoy's  works,  with  its  indexes  and 
bibliographic  material.  For  the  right  to  use  numerous 
quotations  from  copyright  works  I  am  indebted  to  the 
courtesy  and  kindness  of  the  following  publishers:  The 
Century  Company  (Reminiscences  of  Tolstoy,  by  his  son 
Count  Dy^  Tolstoy);  Dodd,  Mead  and  Company  (The 
Life  of  Tolstoy y  by  Aylmer  Maude) ;  Alfred  A.  Knopf 
(The  Journal  of  Leo  Tolstoi,  1895-1899);  G.  P.  Put- 
nam's Sons  (The  Stewardship  of  Faith,  by  Kirsopp  Lake). 

Some  paragraphs  of  this  book  reproduce  in  essentials 
portions  of  my  own  articles  on  Tolstoy  as  a  Man  of 
Letters  (in  the  University  of  California  Chronicle,  April, 
1911)  and  The  Essential  Elements  in  Tolstoy's  Ethical 
System  (in  Anniversary  Papers  by  Colleagues  and  Pupils 
of  George  Lyman  Kittredge,  Boston,  1913).  My  treat- 
ment of  Tolstoy's  What  is  Art?  is  founded  on  suggestions 
from  Mr.  Ian  Ozolin,  to  whom  I  gratefully  acknowledge 
my  debt.  To  my  colleague.  Professor  G.  P.  Adams, 
and  to  Mr.  F.  A.  Postnikov  I  owe  some  suggestions  as  to 
the  analysis  of  Tolstoy's  ethical  system.  The  foot- 
notes acknowledge  some  further  obligations  to  critics  of 
Tolstoy. 

My  colleagues.  Professor  W.  M.  Hart  and  Mr.  A.  S. 
Kaun,  have  read  this  book  in  manuscript  and  have  given 
me  many  helpful  suggestions,  for  which  I  am  heartily 
grateful  to  them.  My  greatest  debt  of  gratitude,  how- 
ever, is  due  to  my  wife,  who  has  given  me  invaluable 


PREFACE 

aid  in  revising  the  text  of  the  work,  which  without 
her  cooperation  would  be  far  more  imperfect  than  it 
is.  She  also  assumed  the  very  serious  task  of  preparing 
the  index  to  the  volume. 


TOLSTOY 


TOLSTOY 


CHAPTER  I 

INTRODUCTION 

jOUNT  LEO  TOLSTOY  is  the  greatest  and 
the  most  many-sided  figure  in  the  literature  of 
Russia,  and  he  is  the  representative  of  that 
country  who  has  been  the  most  powerful  force 
in  the  literature  of  the  world.  Other  Russian  writers, 
such  as  Pushkin  and  Turgenev  before  him,  and  Dostoyev- 
sky  and  Gorky  since  his  day,  have  won  international 
fame,  but  their  popularity  has  been  restricted,  for  the 
most  part,  to  professed  lovers  of  literature.  Tolstoy 
was  the  first  and  only  Russian  to  reach  the  great  reading 
public  of  other  countries,  and  to  become  known  and 
loved  by  the  average  man  as  well  as  by  literary  experts. 
During  the  last  twenty  years  of  his  life  he  was  the 
best-known  citizen  of  the  world  of  thought;  his  portrait 
and  the  general  type  of  his  personality  were  as  familiar 
as  those  of  his  antithesis.  Prince  Bismarck.  When  he 
died  in  1910  no  writer  remained  whose  fame  could  even 
distantly  be  compared  with  his  own.    Works  by  him  had 


4  TOLSTOY 

been  translated  into  almost  all  civilized  languages  and 
had  been  read  by  millions  of  men  and  women,  from 
academicians  to  peasants  and  factory  laborers.  It  is 
safe  to  say  that  no  other  author  has  ever  attained  during 
his  own  lifetime  such  universal  fame  as  Tolstoy. 

Yet  Tolstoy  was  intensely  Russian  in  his  tempera- 
ment and  in  the  most  striking  qualities  of  his  genius. 
His  unflinching  realism,  the  unpoetic  form  and  the  un- 
romantic  tone  of  all  his  work,  his  habitual  neglect  of 
conventional  literary  technique,  his  hatred  of  all  com- 
promise, his  enthusiastic  adoption  of  a  revolutionary  re- 
ligious and  social  philosophy,  the  spirit  of  universal 
brotherly  love  that  fills  his  works,  are  all  qualities  that, 
though  far  from  peculiar  to  Russia,  may  justly  be  called 
national,  Russian  traits. 

Russian  by  temperament,  Tolstoy  described  in  his 
writings,  with  insignificant  exceptions,  only  Russian 
life,  and  furthermore  those  sides  of  Russian  life  with 
which  he  was  familiar  by  personal  experience.  For- 
tunately that  experience  included  the  classes  most  typical 
of  Russia.  His  works  will  preserve  for  all  time  a  pano- 
rama of  Russian  life  from  the  time  of  the  conflict  of  the 
peasant  empire  with  Napoleon  at  the  beginning  of  the 
nineteenth  century  to  the  beginnings  of  the  industrial 
revolution  within  it  at  the  close  of  that  century.  His 
religious  and  social  works  are  quite  as  Russian  in  topic 
as  his  novels;  they  derive  their  strength  and  their 
weakness  from  the  intensely  personal  character  of  the 
observation  of  life  on  which  they  are  based. 


gf^ 


INTRODUCTION  5 

This  Russian  temperament  was  Tolstoy's  rightful 
inheritance.  His  father  and  his  mother  both  belonged 
to  the  highest  Russian  nobility.  The  Tolstoy  family, 
to  be  sure,  are  said  to  have  been  descended  from  a  Ger- 
man who  came  to  Russia  in  the  fourteenth  century,  but 
the  tradition,  even  if  true,  is  of  no  moment;  the  whole 
line  has  been  Russian  to  the  core.  The  first  member 
of  the  family  to  attain  distinction  was  Peter  Tolstoy,  a 
favorite  of  Peter  the  Great,  who,  in  reward  for  services 
more  brilliant  than  honorable,  conferred  on  him  the 
title  of  count.  His  great-grandson.  Count  Ilya  Tolstoy, 
was  the  grandfather  of  the  novelist,  who  used  him  as  a 
model  for  the  elder  Count  Rostov  in  War  and  Peace. 
When  Count  Ilya  died,  leaving  an  estate  encumbered 
by  debt,  his  son  Nikolay,  in  order  to  be  able  to  support 
his  widowed  mother,  his  sister,  and  a  distant  relative, 
Tatyana  Ergolsky,  who  was  a  dependent  in  the  family, 
married  the  wealthy  but  unprepossessing  Princess  Marya 
Volkonsky.  The  situation,  naturally  with  some  changes 
of  detail,  is  reproduced  in  War  and  Peace.  In  contrast 
to  the  family  of  Tolstoy's  father,  who  seem  to  have  been 
plain,  simple-hearted  country  squires,  the  Volkonskys 
were  distinguished  for  intellectual  brilliancy.  Their 
family  is  descended  from  Rurik,  the  founder  of  the 
Russian  empire,  through  the  princes  of  Chernigov;  it 
has  been  constantly  prominent  in  Russian  state  affairs 
and  in  Russian  court  society.  Of  all  the  great  Russian 
authors,  Pushkin  alone  was  of  a  social  station  comparable 
to  that  of  Tolstoy,    Nor  was  Tolstoy  indifferent  to  his 


6  TOLSTOY 

origin.  Aristocratic  traditions  and  pride  of  race  shine 
forth  through  all  his  works,  even  through  those  of  his 
latest  years,  in  which  he  preaches  absolute  humility  and 
the  rejection  of  all  social  distinctions.  His  accents  are 
not  those  of  a  parvenu  or  a  peasant  prophet.  One  may 
repeat  of  him  what  has  been  well  said  of  Lucretius,  that 
his  work  "shows  all  the  courage  and  energy,  the  power 
of  command,  the  sense  of  superiority  and  the  direct 
simplicity  of  manner  emanating  from  it,  which  are  the 
inheritance  of  a  great  governing  class."* 

Leo  (Lev  Nikolayevich)  Tolstoy  was  born  on  Septem- 
*  ber  9  (August  28,  old  style),  1828,  at  Yasnaya  Polyana, 
a  family  estate  of  the  Volkonskys,  in  the  province  of 
Tula,  near  the  center  of  European  Russia.  He  had 
three  brothers  older  than  himself,  Nikolay,  Sergey,  and 
Dmitry,  and  a  younger  sister  Marya.  The  Countess 
Tolstoy  died  in  1830,  in  giving  birth  to  her  daughter. 
Seven  years  later  the  children  lost  their  father  as 
well,  and  were  left  to  the  care  of  guardians  and 
tutors. 

Thus  Leo  Tolstoy  grew  up  in  a  family  of  Russian  gentry 
of  the  purest  type.  Among  such  people  could  be  found 
whatever  was  good  in  Russian  traditions  and  culture. 
The  society  of  which  they  formed  a  part  was  not  unlike 
that  of  the  aristocratic  families  in  the  southern  states 
of  our  own  country  before  the  Civil  War.  A  class  of 
wealthy   landowners   was   supported   by   the  labor  of 

*  Sellar: — The  Roman  Poets  of  the  Augustan  Age:  Virgil  (Oxford, 
1877),  p.  203. 


INTRODUCTION  7 

serfs,  who  cultivated  the  broad  acres  extending  around 
the  ancestral  manor,  and  with  whom  their  relations  were 
on  the  whole  kindly  and  patriarchal.  In  the  manor  the 
owners  led  a  life  of  free,  open-handed  hospitality. 
For  them  country  life  consisted  partly  of  work,  in  the 
superintendence  of  their  estates,  partly  of  sport,  in 
hunting  game  with  hounds.  Those  of  them  who  were 
at  all  prosperous  spent  only  the  summer  at  their  manors; 
the  winter  they  passed  at  their  city  residences  in  St. 
Petersburg  or  Moscow,  leading  a  society  life  of  parties, 
theaters,  and  dinners  such  as  is  the  common  portion  of 
the  dwellers  in  all  European  capitals.  Since  no  gentle- 
man could  engage  in  commerce  or  industry  without  a 
certain  loss  of  caste,  and  since  even  professional  life  was 
not  in  favor,  these  nobles  could  choose  no  occupation 
except  service  under  the  government,  and  a  career  in 
the  army  was  reckoned  more  honorable  than  one  in  the 
civil  service.  In  either  case,  through  his  social  con- 
nections, each  man  of  fair  talent  was  assured  of  a  pros- 
perous career. 

Such  is  the  society  that  Tolstoy  describes  in  his 
novels,  not  departing  from  it  until  his  religious  con- 
version gave  him  new  interests  and  new  points  of  view. 
The  world  of  Childhood,  Boyhood,  and  Youth;  War  and 
Peace;  and  Anna  Karenin,  is  composed  of  wealthy, 
idle  aristocrats  and  toiling  peasants.  The  city  is  a  great 
amusement  park,  in  which  the  only  workers,  if  we  ex- 
cept coachmen  and  domestic  servants,  are  the  holders 
of  government  positions.    Other  laborers  there  may  be. 


8  TOLSTOY 

but  they  have  not  yet  attracted  Tolstoy's  attention.  In 
Anna  Karenin  he  shows  his  distinct  dishke  of  the  whole 
merchant  class.  In  the  country,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
humbler  folk  come  to  their  own;  the  huntsmen  with 
whom  Nikolay  Rostov  lies  in  wait  for  wolves,  the 
reapers  beside  whom  Levin  toils  in  the  hay  field,  are 
beings  with  a  definite  character,  men  whom  Tolstoy 
has  known  and  loved. 

Such  a  social  order  will  in  every  country  produce  the 
same  results.  On  the  one  hand  are  courtesy,  kindliness, 
refinement  of  the  truest  sort,  coupled  with  an  abiding 
faith  in  the  excellence  of  the  conditions  that  have 
fostered  this  same  refinement  and  high  breeding.  On 
the  reverse  of  the  medal  are  drunkenness,  lechery,  and 
a  callous  indifference  to  the  sufferings  of  persons  less 
fortunate  by  birth.  In  such  an  environment  indi- 
viduality may  develop  unchecked;  there  is  no  dull  gray 
level  of  democratic  uniformity.  Many  men  may  de- 
generate into  rakes  or  servile  courtiers;  a  few  may 
become  thinkers,  originators  of  new  ideas,  preachers  of 
new  moral  doctrines. 

In  the  case  of  Tolstoy  the  checks  upon  the  develop- 
ment of  individuality  were  even  fewer  than  with  most 
young  Russian  nobles.  Until  the  age  of  sixteen  he  was 
educated  at  home  by  private  tutors,  and  was  thus  free 
from  that  constant  contact  with  comrades  of  his  own 
age  and  station  which  in  an  English  or  American  school 
trims  away  personal  eccentricities  and  accustoms  a  boy 
to  cooperation  with  his  fellows.     His  personality  was 


INTRODUCTION  9 

molded  only  by  association  with  his  relatives  and  with 
their  aristocratic  friends. 

Tolstoy's  temperament  in  boyhood  was  passionate, 
jealous,  vain,  but  affectionate,  impressionable,  aspiring, 
and  truth-seeking;  truth-telling  also,  to  himself  if  not 
always  to  others.  He  worked  intermittently,  as  the  fit 
came  upon  him;  neither  then  nor  at  any  later  time 
would  he  persevere  in  a  task  that  proved  uncongenial. 
From  his  tutors  he  acquired  little  systematic  book- 
learning;  but  from  them,  and  from  practice  in  society, 
he  gained  a  fine  command  of  French  and  German.  He 
prided  himself  particularly  on  the  elegance  of  his  French, 
the  mark  in  Russia  of  a  polished  gentleman.  Later  in 
life  he  became  well  acquainted  with  English. 

Tolstoy's  youthful  years  were  outwardly  neither 
striking  nor  edifying.  In  1844  he  entered  the  Uni- 
versity of  Kazan,  being  enrolled  first  in  the  Division  of 
Arabo-Turkish  Literature  and  later  in  the  Faculty  of 
Law.  He  did  no  studying  of  consequence  and  became 
filled  with  an  intense  and  lasting  disgust  for  the  formal 
requirements  of  the  university,  its  methods  of  instruc- 
tion, and  its  influence  on  the  students.  These  ideas  he 
sets  forth  in  an  article  on  Education  and  Culture,  pub- 
lished in  1862.  The  following  quotation  will  show  its 
general  tone: 

Almost  always,  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  students,  the 
lectures  are  a  mere  formality,  indispensable  only  in  view  of 
the  examination.  The  majority  of  the  students  during  their 
stay  at  the  university,  do  not  study  the  prescribed  subjects. 


10  TOLSTOY 

but  others,  the  program  of  which  is  determined  by  some  club 

that  they  happen  to  join Here  all  is  prescribed  not  in 

accordance  with  its  real  value,  but  in  proportion  to  the  severity 
with  which  it  is  forbidden  by  the  authorities.  I  have  seen  in 
students'  rooms  heaps  of  manuscript  volumes  beyond  com- 
parison larger  than  the  entire  requirements  of  the  four  years' 
course,  and  among  them  thick  copybooks  of  the  most  disgusting 
poems  of  Pushkin  and  the  most  stupid  and  colorless  poems  of 
Ryleyev.  Another  favorite  occupation  consists  of  meetings 
and  discussions  about  the  most  various  and  important  topics; 
such  as  the  restoration  of  the  independence  of  Little  Russia, 
the  spread  of  literacy  among  the  peasantry,  or  the  playing  of 

some  cooperative  trick  on  a  professor  or  inspector All 

this  is  sometimes  ridiculous,  but  is  often  attractive,  touching, 
and  poetic,  as  idle  young  men  often  are. 

Tolstoy  did  become  interested,  however,  in  a  dis- 
\  sertation  upon  the  influence  of  Montesquieu  on  the  legis- 
lation of  Catherine  II.  Of  this  he  writes:  "It  opened 
to  me  a  new  field  of  independent  intellectual  work,  but 
the  University  with  its  requirements  not  only  did  not 
contribute  to  such  work,  but  hindered  it."*  Thus 
his  newly  awakened  intellectual  enthusiasm  was  one 
cause  of  his  abandoning  the  University  of  Kazan  in 
1847,  without  completing  his  course. 

In  the  year  after  leaving  Kazan,  Tolstoy  went  to  St. 
Petersburg,  where,  after  wavering  between  an  impulse 
to  enter  the  army  and  a  desire  to  complete  his  university 
course,  he  attempted  to  take  the  graduation  examina- 
tions at  the  University  of  St.  Petersburg.  After  a 
♦  Biryuk6v:  I,  131. 


n 


INTRODUCTION  11 

week's  cramming,  he  passed  in  civil  and  criminal  law. 
*'Then  all  my  good  resolutions  went  to  pieces.  Spring 
came,  and  the  charm  of  country  life  drew  me  back  to 
my  estate."*  The  next  three  years  were  perhaps  the 
least  admirable  in  his  life.  They  were  spent  partly  at 
Yasnaya  Polyana,  where  he  started  a  school  for  the 
peasants  and  made  futile  efforts  to  organize  his  estate 
on  philanthropic  principles  such  as  he  later  described  in 
A  Morning  of  a  Landed  Proprietor  (1856),  partly  in  so- 
ciety life  in  Moscow.  Despite  ideal  aspirations  and 
an  attempt  to  do  good  to  his  peasants,  his  outward 
existence  was  much  the  same  as  that  of  other  wealthy 
young  Russians;  he  drank,  was  loose  in  his  conduct 
with  women,  gambled  and  involved  himself  in  debt. 
But  he  was  ill  at  ease,  and  eager  to  escape  from  the 
temptations  of  a  purposeless  life.  When,  in  April,  1851, 
his  brother  Nikolay,  who  had  been  serving  as  an  oflScer 
in  the  Caucasus,  returned  home  on  a  furlough,  he  seized 
the  opportunity  to  accompany  him  on  his  return  to  the 
army.  There  he  was  presented  to  Prince  Baryatinsky, 
the  commander  in  chief,  who,  observing  his  conduct 
during  an  expedition  against  the  mountaineers,  com- 
plimented him  on  his  bravery  and  urged  him  to  join  the 
service.  Accordingly,  early  in  1852  he  became  a  yunker, 
or  volunteer  officer.^  The  next  two  years,  up  to  the 
outbreak  of  the  war  between  Russia  and  Turkey,  he 
spent  mainly  in  the  Cossack  villages  of  Starogladkovskaya 
and  Stary  Yurt,  leading  a  life  such  as  he  described 
*Biryuk6v:  I,  152. 


n  TOLSTOY 

later  in  The  Cossacks.  The  Russians  were  engaged  in 
guerilla  warfare  with  tribes  of  mountaineers  who  had 
never  submitted  to  the  imperial  authority.  They  were 
slowly  pressing  upon  them,  destroying  their  villages  and 
above  all  felling  the  forests  that  shielded  them  from 
attack.  Between  these  expeditions  the  officers  had 
ample  time  for  hunting  and  for  sport  of  all  sorts  with  the 
Cossack  borderers  among  whom  they  were  quartered. 

The  real  biography  of  Tolstoy  in  these  years  that 
led  up  to  his  first  literary  work  is  found  in  his  intellectual 
and  spiritual  life,  which  is  revealed  to  us  with  sufficient 
clearness  in  his  letters  and  in  his  diary.  Here  we  see 
the  moral  aspirations  that  were  to  give  depth  to  his  fiction 
and  to  find  full  expression  in  the  didactic  works  of  his  later 
years.     Of  this  period  he  later  wrote  in  his  Confession: 

My  only  real  faith  at  that  time  was  faith  in  self-perfection. 
But  in  what  self-perfection  consisted  and  what  was  the  aim  of 
it  I  could  not  have  said.  I  tried  to  perfect  myself  intellectually 
— I  studied  everything  that  I  could  and  everj'^thing  with  which 
life  brought  me  in  contact;  I  tried  to  perfect  my  will — I  com- 
posed rules  for  myself  that  I  tried  to  follow;  I  perfected  myself 
physically,  developing  my  strength  and  agility  by  all  sorts  of 
exercises  and  training  myself  to  endurance  and  patience  by  all 
sorts  of  privations.  And  all  this  I  regarded  as  self-perfection. 
The  beginning  of  all  was,  of  course,  moral  perfection,  but  that 
was  soon  replaced  by  perfection  in  general,  that  is,  by  the 
desire  to  be  better  not  with  regard  to  myself  or  with  regard 
to  God,  but  by  the  desire  to  be  better  with  regard  to  other  men. 
And  very  soon  this  striving  to  be  better  with  regard  to  men  was 
replaced  by  a  desire  to  be  stronger  than  other  men;   that  is, 


INTROBtJCTlON  IS 

more  famous,  more  important,  richer  than  others. — [Ch,  1. 
Compare  pp.  205-8,  158,  below.] 

Quite  in  accord  with  this  is  the  following  passage  from 
his  diary,  written  at  about  the  time  of  his  leaving  the 
University  of  Kazan: 

The  aim  of  life  is  a  conscious  striving  for  the  development  on 
all  sides  of  everything  that  exists. 

The  aim  of  my  life  in  the  country  for  the  next  two  years  is: 
(1)  To  master  the  whole  course  of  the  legal  sciences  neces- 
sary for  the  final  examinations  at  the  University.  (2)  To 
master  practical  medicine  and  a  portion  of  theoretic  medicine. 
(3)  To  master  the  French,  Russian,  German,  English,  Italian, 
and  Latin  languages.  (4)  To  learn  agriculture,  both  theoreti- 
cally and  practically.  (5)  To  learn  history,  geography,  and 
statistics.  (6)  To  learn  mathematics,  the  gymnasium  course. 
(7)  To  write  a  dissertation.  (8)  To  reach  a  higher  degree 
of  perfection  in  music  and  painting.  (9)  To  write  rules  for 
myself.  (10)  To  gain  some  knowledge  of  the  natural  sciences. 
(11)  To  write  treatises  or.  all  the  subjects  that  I  shall  study. — 
[Biryukov:  I,  145.] 

Milton  himself  was  not  more  ambitious  in  his  plans 
for  self -improvement!  Tolstoy  was  ultimately  to  rise 
on  stepping-stones  of  his  dead  self  to  higher  things, 
but  for  a  time  his  movement  seemed  downward  rather 
than  upward.  The  unregenerate  animal  often  prevailed. 
Only  a  year  later,  after  his  fiasco  at  St.  Petersburg,  he 
wrote  to  his  brother: 

Serezha,  I  think  that  you  are  already  saying  that  I  am  **an 
absolutely  worthless  fellow,"  and  you  are  telling  the  truth. 


14  TOLSTOY 

Lord  knows  what  things  I  have  done!  I  went  to  St.  Peters- 
burg without  any  reason  whatever,  and  I  did  nothing  useful 
there;  merely  squandered  heaps  of  money  and  got  into  debt. — 
[Biryuk6v:  I,  154.] 

This  union  of  high  aspiration  with  an  irregular  and 
sordid  outward  existence  is  of  course  peculiar  to  no  age 
or  nation,  but  it  is  certainly  more  common  among 
the  dreamy  and  emotional  Russians  than  among  our 
own  well-disciplined  and  practical  folk.  Life  in  America 
tends  towards  a  consistent  dead  level  of  Philistine 
respectability,  above  which  it  is  dangerous  to  aspire. 
One  must  be  as  moral  as  society  demands  and  as  out- 
wardly successful  as  is  possible  within  the  limits  of  that 
morality.  Standards  in  Russia  are  more  elastic,  granting 
to  all  classes  of  society  an  easy  charity  such  as  we 
extend  only  to  Bohemian  artists.  So  long  as  a  man  is 
an  agreeable  companion  and  observes  a  conventional 
code  of  honor,  his  private  life  is  his  own  concern.  The 
looseness  of  standards  that  results  from  this  point  of 
view  shocks  a  traveler  of  Puritan  antecedents.  On 
the  other  hand  fine  impulses  of  kindliness  and  un- 
selfishness, generous  enthusiasms  of  all  sorts,  play 
a  larger  part  in  the  Russian  nature  than  in  our 
own. 

In  his  serious  groping  after  a  moral  law  by  which  to 
guide  his  life  Leo  Tolstoy  was  not  alone  in  his  family. 
His  sister  Marya  became  a  nun  in  her  later  years.  His 
brother  Dmitry,  after  leading  almost  an  ascetic  life, 
suddenly    degenerated    into    debauchery;     then,    in    a 


INTRODUCTION  15 

characteristic  access  of  nobility,  he  rausomed  from  a  y 
brothel  the  first  woman  he  had  known  and  kept  her 
with  him  until  his  death.    His  career  is  reflected  in  that 
of  Nikolay  Levin  in  Anna  Karenin. 

Tolstoy's  struggles  with  himself  at  this  period  were 
not  religious  in  the  narrower  sense.  In  his  Confession  he 
writes: 

After  the  age  of  sixteen  I  ceased  to  kneel  in  prayer  and  of 
my  own  accord  ceased  to  go  to  church  and  to  prepare  for  the 
sacrament.  I  did  not  believe  in  what  had  been  taught  me  from 
my  childhood,  but  I  did  believe  in  something.  In  what  I 
believed  I  should  have  been  absolutely  unable  to  say.  I  even 
believed  in  God,  or  rather  I  did  not  deny  God — but  in 
what  God  I  should  not  have  been  able  to  say.  Neither 
did  I  deny  Christ  and  his  teaching,  but  in  what  his  teach- 
ing consisted  I  should  also  have  been  unable  to  say. — 
[Ch.  1.] 

This  agrees  with  what  is  known  of  him  from  other 
sources.  In  a  letter  to  his  "Aunt  Tatyana,"  written 
January  18,  1852,  he  told  her,  with  no  apparent  sense 
of  incongruity,  how  he  had  made  a  fervent  prayer  to 
God  to  extricate  him  from  a  gambUng  debt — a  prayer 
heard  and  answered  by  a  benevolent  deity.  His  kins- 
woman the  Countess  Alexandra  Tolstoy  remarks  of  him 
as  he  appeared  in  1857:  "At  that  time  he  was  by  no 
means  an  opponent  of  the  church;  and,  seeing  us  all 
preparing  for  confession,  he  started  to  do  so  himself — in 
which,  however,  he  did  not  succeed."*  As  to  the  future 
*  Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  p.  6. 


16  TOLSTOY 

life  he  wrote  to  this  same  kinswoman  in  1859,  referring  to 
his  stay  in  the  Caucasus: 

That  was  both  a  torturing  and  a  good  period  of  my  life  .... 
All  that  I  discovered  then  will  forever  remain  my  convic- 
tion       From  two  years  of  mental  toil  I  found  out  a  simple 

old  thing,  but  one  which  I  know  as  no  one  else  does — I  found 
out  that  immortality  exists,  that  love  exists,  and  that  one  must 
live  for  others  in  order  to  be  eternally  happy.* 

Yet  in  the  next  year,  writing  to  the  same  correspondent, 
he  denies  any  faith  in  immortality:  "It  seems  to  me 
that  it  is  impossible  to  believe  in  that  sincerely;  it 
would  be  too  good!"  f  I^  general,  not  even  the  most 
fundamental  dogmas  ever  occupied  Tolstoy's  mind  so 
much  as  questions  of  practical  morality. 

Tolstoy's  choice  of  reading  during  this  formative 
period  gives  clear  indications  of  his  personal  character, 
of  his  intellectual  convictions,  and  of  certain  features 
of  his  artistic  genius.  The  books  which  he  states  had 
"immense"  influence  on  him  were:  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount  in  the  Gospel  of  Matthew,  Rousseau's  Con- 
fessions  and  Emile,  and  Dickens's  David  Copperfield; 
those  that  had  "very  great"  influence  were  Sterne's 
Sentimental  Journey ,  Rousseau's  Nouvelle  Heloise,  Push- 
kin's Eugene  Onegin,  Schiller's  Robbers,  Gogol's  Dead 
Souls,  Turgenev's  Sportsman's  Sketches,  Grigorovich's 
Anton  Goremyka,  and  Lermontov's  Hero  of  our  Time; 
while    some    of    Gogol's    short    stories    and    Prescott's 

*  Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A,  Tolstoy,  p.  131. 
t  Ibid.,  p.  142. 


INTRODUCTION  17 

Conquest  of  Mexico  had  "great"  influence.  It  is  note- 
worthy that  in  this  Hst  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  stands 
at  the  very  top.  The  precepts  of  brotherly  love,  of  uni- 
versal forgiveness,  of  non-resistance  to  evil,  were  already 
dear  to  Tolstoy's  heart.  They  constituted  his  ideal 
all  through  his  life,  however  much  his  conduct  may  have 
fallen  short  of  them. 

Next  to  the  Gospel  Tolstoy  places  the  work  of  Rous- 
seau, which  was  perhaps  even  more  potent  in  molding 
his  ideas.    Of  Rousseau  he  once  said: 

Men  have  been  unjust  to  Rousseau,  the  grandeur  of  his 
thought  has  not  been  recognized,  he  has  been  slandered  in 
all  sorts  of  ways.  I  have  read  all  Rousseau,  all  the  twenty 
volumes,  including  the  Dictionary  of  Music.  I  was  more  than 
delighted  with  him;  I  adored  him.  At  the  age  of  fifteen  I 
wore  around  my  neck,  instead  of  the  customary  cross,  a  me- 
dallion with  his  portrait.  Many  of  his  pages  are  so  hear  to  me 
that  it  seems  to  me  that  I  wrote  them  myself. — [Biryuk6v:  I, 
269,  270.] 

This  statement  is  fundamental  for  any  understanding 
of  Tolstoy.  One  must  then  inquire  what  were  the  aspects 
of  Rousseau's  genius  that  most  appealed  to  him.  One  may 
place  first  of  all  Rousseau's  hatred  of  artificiality,  pre- 
tence, and  convention;  his  praise  of  whatever  is  natural. 
With  this  doctrine  Tolstoy  was  sympathetic  by  tem- 
perament; it  underlies  every  page  of  his  own  writing 
from  the  very  beginning  of  his  work.  To  it  he  was  not 
always  true  in  practice:  vanity  was  a  sin  against  which 


y 


18  TOLSTOY 

he  constantly  struggled,  and  in  Youth  he  satirizes  his 
own  eagerness  to  comply  with  the  most  petty  con- 
ventions of  society  dress.  Not  less  in  accord  with  his 
mode  of  thought  was  Rousseau's  praise  of  the  country 
and  his  hatred  of  the  city.  For  Tolstoy  the  country 
was  the  place  of  wholesome  work  and  pure  enjoyment, 
the  city  was  that  of  perverted  pleasure.  Finally,  Rous- 
seau's panegyric  on  home  life  in  La  Nouvelle  Helmse  ap- 
pealed to  Tolstoy's  deepest  convictions;  delight  in  home 
life  breathes  from  every  page  of  Childhood,  and  is  the 
ruling  passion  of  War  and  Peace  and  Anna  Karenin. 

The  fact  that  the  Confessions  and  Emile  are  singled 
out  as  having  been  of  "immense"  influence  is  significant. 
The  absolute  frankness  of  the  Confessions  (whether  real 
or  apparent  need  not  be  discussed  here)  harmonized 
with  Tolstoy's  aspirations  and  doubtless  affected  his 
own  literary  methods.  Unlike  other  narrators  of  their 
own  development,  Rousseau  does  not  confine  himself 
to  the  nobler  sides  of  his  own  character  or  to  his  winning 
and  attractive  human  failings;  to  his  sins  he  lends  no 
air  of  romance;  he  tells  candidly  of  base,  ignoble  deeds, 
of  cowardice,  ingratitude,  and  deceit.  This  method  of 
self-revelation  Tolstoy  brought  to  perfection  in  his 
novels.  We  like  his  heroes  despite  their  creator's  frank- 
ness rather  than  because  of  it. 

In  Emile,  his  treatise  on  education,  Rousseau  makes 
his  guiding  principle  the  unfolding  and  developing  of 
the  natural  powers,  free  from  the  corrupting  influence 
of  society.     "A  truly  natural  man  desires  to  do  only 


INTRODUCTION  1§ 

what  is  within  his  power,  and  does  what  is  pleasing  to 
him."  Books  are  set  aside  until  a  comparatively  late 
period;  true  education  is  derived  from  experience  and 
from  intercourse  with  one's  fellows.  Furthermore,  a 
democratic  ideal  pervades  the  book;  the  rich  young 
aristocrat  Emile  is  made  to  associate  familiarly  with  his 
peasant  neighbors,  and  has  to  learn  a  trade,  as  a  pre- 
caution against  possible  loss  of  wealth.  To  each  of  these 
principles  Tolstoy  eagerly  responded.  That  he  had  an 
early  interest  in  the  problems  of  education  is  shown  by 
his  abortive  experiment  of  1849;  when  he  later  took  up 
in  earnest  the  trade  of  schoolmaster  he  worked  in  the 
spirit  of  Rousseau. 

With  Rousseau's  attack  on  civilization  as  the  cause 
of  more  evil  than  good  Tolstoy  came  to  have  ever  greater 
sympathy  as  his  years  advanced.  A  long  list  could  be 
made  of  minor  doctrines  of  Rousseau  with  which  he 
was  in  agreement,  such  for  example  as  his  dislike  of 
medicine  and  doctors  and  his  abhorrence  of  the  evils 
worked  on  peasants  by  taxation.  Most  important, 
Tolstoy,  brought  up  on  Rousseau,  remained  an  intui- 
tionist  and  an  emotionalist  all  his  life.  He  never  ac- 
quired any  admiration  for  the  methods  of  experimental 
science  as  applied  to  the  study  of  human  society.  In 
this  respect  he  was  a  man  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

Even  Rousseau's  sentimentality  was  at  this  period  of 
his  life  not  uncongenial  to  Tolstoy,  as  is  shown  sufficiently 
by  the  fact  that  he  coupled  Sterne's  Sentimental  Journey 
with  La  Nouvelle  Helaise  at  the  head  of  the  books  that 


20  TOLSTOY 

had  "very  great"  influence  on  him.  The  fact  is  at  first 
surprising.  Rousseau  was  half  an  invahd,  dreamy, 
morbid,  a  recluse  and  a  hypochondriac;  Tolstoy  was 
strong,  healthy,  fond  of  society,  a  lover  of  energetic 
physical  life.  His  doctrine  that  "calm  is  spiritual  base- 
ness"* is  at  the  other  pole  from  the  sentimental  languor 
of  Rousseau.  He  had,  however,  a  constant  tendency  to 
self-analysis,  and  a  keen  delight  in  the  minute  record  of 
his  own  sensations,  traits  which  are  prominent  through- 
out his  work,  though  they  never  lead  to  the  sickly,  hot- 
house sentimentality  that  makes  La  Nouvelle  Helaise  so 
unpalatable  to  modern  readers.  At  times  he  was  prone 
to  tears.  To  this  weakness  he  refers  when  in  a  letter 
of  1852  he  calls  himself  "Cry-baby  Leo."t  But  his 
sobs  were  bursts  of  grief  interspersed  amid  active  play  or 
work,  very  unlike  the  plaintive  wail  of  Rousseau.  This 
side  of  his  nature  he  seems  to  have  partially  suppressed 
with  advancing  years;  his  son  Ilya  speaks  of  his  aversion 
for  outward  manifestations  of  feeling. J  Yet  the  same 
witness  tells  how  his  father  once  sobbed  with  emotion 
during  a  talk  with  him.§ 

In  this  list  of  reading  works  of  fiction  have  rather  a 
subordinate  place,  and  those  actually  mentioned  ap- 
parently interested  Tolstoy  by  their  undying  ideas 
rather  than  by  their  excellence  of  style  and  literary 
form.     In  David  Copperfield,  if  one  may  hazard  a  con- 

*  Correspondence  with  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy^  p.  94. 
fBiryukov:  I,  189.  J  See  p.  138,  below. 

§  Count  Ilyd  Tolstoy:  Reminiscences  of  Tolstoy,  p.  319. 


INTRODUCTION  21 

jecture,  he  was  attracted  by  the  touching  picture  of 
child  Hfe  in  the  earher  chapters  and  by  the  adulation  of 
the  home  that  runs  through  the  novel,  rather  than  by  the 
melodramatic  plot.  Tolstoy  never  ceased  to  regard 
Dickens  as  the  greatest  of  English  authors,  remarking 
that  "  Gogol  resembled  him  in  humor,  but  had  not  his 
broad  humane  sympathies."*  Throughout  his  life, 
though  he  corrected  his  own  works  with  great  care,  Tol- 
stoy was  almost  indifferent  to  questions  of  formal  style 
and  literary  technique.  Of  criticism  he  wrote  nothing 
until  after  his  religious  conversion,  and  then  only  as  a 
sort  of  corollary  to  his  religious  system.  In  his  early 
writings  one  may  find  the  ideas  and  the  frankness  of 
his  idol  Rousseau,  but  very  few  traces  of  the  literary 
technique  of  either  Rousseau  or  Dickens  or  Sterne. 

In  a  word,  Tolstoy,  great  literary  genius  though  he 
was,  was  mercifully  free  from  what  we  commonly  term 
the  literary  temperament;  he  cared  for  the  substance 
of  life  more  than  he  did  for  its  reflection  in  literature; 
and  in  literature  he  cared  for  the  content  more  than  for 
the  form.  There  is  no  record  that  he  ever  read  a  single 
poem  with  pure  delight  in  the  melodious  sound  of  the 
lines.  One  of  his  companions  at  the  university  records 
how  he  "spoke  ironically  of  verse  in  general."t  In  later 
years  he  expressed  himself  similarly: 

In  the  days  of  Pushkin  and  L^rmontov  there  used  to  be 
poetry,  but  not  now.    Verses  have  gone  out  of  fashion.    And 

*  Maude:  II,  645.  f  Biryukov:  I,  126, 


/ 


22  TOLSTOY 

wliat*s  the  good  of  them?  You  will  agree  that  prose  expresses 
our  thoughts  much  better — it  is  easier  to  read  and  has  more 
sense  in  it.  Take  our  conversation,  for  instance :  we  say  what 
we  want  to.  But  if  some  one  tried  to  put  it  into  verse,  it  would 
come  out  all  upside-down.  Wherever  a  definite,  clear  ex- 
pression is  wanted,  it  either  spoils  the  rhythm,  or  doesn't 
suit  the  style:  and  one  has  to  substitute  some  other  word, 
often  far  from  the  real  meaning. — [Quoted  by  Maude,  II,  518; 
compare  p.  347,  below.] 

The  poets,  the  verse-makers  torture  their  tongues  in  order 
to  be  able  to  say  every  possible  kind  of  thought  in  every 
possible  variety  of  word  and  to  be  able  to  form  from  all  these 
words  something  which  resembles  a  thought.  Such  exercise 
can  only  be  indulged  in  by  unserious  people.  And  so  it  is. 
—[Journal,  Feb.  4,  1897;   tr.  Strunsky,  p.  119.] 

He  himself  wrote  no  verse  whatever,  if  we  except  some 
jesting  lines  on  incidents  at  Sevastopol  and  similar 
doggerel  composed  for  the  family  letter  box,  an  epistle 
to  his  friend  Fet,  and  a  very  few  serious  lines.  He 
gained  a  new  conception  of  Pushkin's  genius  from 
reading  Merimee's  prose  version  of  The  Gypsies* 

Of  painting  Tolstoy  was  fond,  but  it  was  not  one  of 
his  main  interests.  The  art  that  affected  him  most 
strongly  was  music,  to  which  he  was  passionately  de- 
voted. And  of  this  in  his  later  years  he  came  to  have  a 
certain  dread,  since  it  aroused  his  emotional  nature 
witKouFteaching  a  clear  moral  lesson. f 

Tfius  one  Ts  not  surprised  to  find  as  a  boy  Tolstoy 
made  no  experiments  in  literary  composition.  His 
*  Biryukov:  I,  246,  299.  f  Compare  p.  348,  below. 


INTRODUCTION  23 

art  waited  until  he  had  experience  on  which  to  base  his 
work.  His  first  plans  of  authorship  were  formed  in  1850, 
when  he  thought  of  writing  a  story  of  gypsy  life  and  also 
an  imitation  of  Sterne's  Sentimental  Journey,  Two 
years  later,  during  his  residence  in  the  Caucasus,  he 
set  to  work  in  earnest,  and  at  the  age  of  twenty-three  he 
produced  a  masterpiece  in  his  semi-autobiographical 
tale.  Childhood, 


CHAPTER  II 

EARLY  WORKS 

|N  July,  1852,  Tolstoy  finished  his  story, 
Childhoody  and  sent  it  to  the  Contemporary ^ 
then  the  leading  literary  journal  in  Russia, 
edited  by  the  poet  Nekrasov.  The  work 
was  at  once  accepted  and  was  printed  in  the  same 
year,  signed  only  with  the  initials  L.  N.  Nekrasov  him- 
self did  not  know  the  real  name  of  the  author  until 
he  had  approved  the  manuscript.  He  wrote  to  Tolstoy, 
sending  him  praises  but  no  money,  explaining  in  a 
second  letter  that  it  was  not  usual  to  pay  writers  for 
their  first  work,  but  that  in  the  future  he  should  be 
glad  to  receive  further  contributions  from  him,  and 
would  pay  him  fifty  rubles  per  printed  sheet  of  sixteen 
pages,  the  price  received  by  the  best  authors.  He 
added  that  the  tale  had  been  well  received  by  the 
public. 

Childhood  is  an  unpretentious  narrative  of  life  in  a 
Russian  well-to-do  family.  A  growing  boy  records  his 
impressions  of  the  events  and  persons  around  him.  In 
1853  and  1854  Tolstoy  continued  the  story  with  Boy- 
hood, and  in  1856  with  Youth,  after  which  he  abandoned 

24 


EARLY  WORKS  25 

the  work,  which  still  remains  a  torso.  The  three  parts 
have  essentially  the  same  literary  qualities  and  already 
show  the  distinguishing  marks  of  Tolstoy's  genius. 
The  book  is  genuinely  original,  though  the  form  may 
have  been  suggested  by  the  Family  Chronicle  of 
Aksakov.  Perhaps  David  Copperfield  gave  an  im- 
pulse to  the  story  of  child  life,  and  possibly  a  sugges- 
tion for  the  carousal  scene  in  Youth.  The  author  him- 
self acknowledges  the  strong  influence  of  Sterne  and 
Topffer  (see  p.  36),  but  probably  exaggerates  its  im- 
portance. 

In  this  book,  as  in  others  that  were  to  follow,  Tolstoy 
paid  no  heed  to  plot;  the  story  delights  us  by  the  charm 
of  single  incidents  and  scenes.  And  these  incidents,  and 
the  characters  who  take  part  in  them,  were  with  few 
exceptions  drawn  from  the  author's  personal  experience. 
No  author  was  more  loth  to  depart  from  the  material 
of  actual  life  than  was  Tolstoy,  no  one  was  more  abso- 
lutely a  realist  in  the  most  literal  sense  of  the  term.  Thus 
the  kindly  German  tutor  Karl  Mauer,  the  repulsive 
French  tutor  St.-Jerome,  the  French  governess  Mimi  and 
her  daughter,  the  trusty  housekeeper  Natalya  Savishna, 
were  all  drawn  from  persons  familiar  to  Tolstoy  in  his 
childhood.  The  narrator,  Nikolay  Irtenyev,  is  naturally, 
in  large  measure,  a  reproduction  of  the  boy  Tolstoy; 
another  character,  Dmitry  Nekhlyudov,  also  has  auto- 
biographic traits.  But  the  book  is  a  spiritual,  not  a 
literal  autobiography;  events  are  altered  and  personali- 
ties transposed  so  that  the  book  is  not  a  mere  narrative 


^6  TOLSTOY 

of  happenings  in  the  Tolstoy  family.  Just  as  Words- 
worth employed  in  his  poetry  "a  selection  of  language 
really  used  by  men,"  so  Tolstoy  built  his  fiction  from  a 
selection  of  the  experiences  of  average  humanity.  And  in 
Tolstoy  as  in  Wordsworth  "the  feeling  developed  gives 
importance  to  the  action  and  situation,  and  not  the  action 
and  situation  to  the  feeling." 

In  Childhoodf  Boyhood,  and  Youth  one  sees  already 
the  two  sides  of  Tolstoy's  nature,  which  run  parallel 
all  through  his  life,  sometimes  in  sharp  conflict  with 
each  other;  on  the  one  hand  his  eager  enjoyment  of 
animal  life,  his  delight  in  his  own  physical  health  and 
in  the  charm  of  the  external  world,  and  on  the  other 
his  introspective,  brooding  temperament,  ever  seeking 
for  a  moral  system  by  which  he  may  guide  his  conduct. 
The  first  finds  expression  in  his  genius  for  observation, 
in  his  unique  power  of  selecting  just  those  concrete  de- 
tails that  will  give  the  reader  the  most  vivid  impression 
of  the  scene  described;  the  second  makes  itself  felt 
in  his  analysis  of  mental  states,  his  passion  for 
sincerity,  and  his  ever-present  interest  in  moral 
problems. 

The  descriptions  of  nature  in  this  early  work  already 
bear  witness  to  that  bubbhng  delight  in  outdoor  life, 
to  that  joy  in  communion  with  the  life  of  the  universe, 
which  found  its  fullest  expression  in  War  and  Peace, 
Tolstoy  does  not  see  with  the  eye  of  a  painter;  he  has 
small  interest  in  what  is  picturesque,  or,  in  a  conventional 
sense  of  the  word,  beautiful.     He  rather  describes  the 


EARLY  WORKS  27 

influence  of  an  outdoor  scene  on  a  lad's  inarticulate  sense 
of  physical  well-being: 

Sometimes,  rather  often  in  fact,  I  got  up  early.  (I  slept  in 
the  open  air  on  the  porch,  and  the  bright,  slanting  rays  of  the 
morning  sun  would  awaken  me.)  I  dressed  quickly,  took  a 
towel  under  my  arm  and  a  volume  of  a  French  novel,  and  went 
to  bathe  in  the  river  in  the  shade  of  a  birch  wood  about  a  half- 
mile  from  the  house.  There  I  lay  down  on  the  grass  in  the 
shade  and  read,  occasionally  tearing  away  my  eyes  from 
the  book  to  glance  at  the  surface  of  the  river,  which  showed 
purple  in  the  shadow  and  was  beginning  to  be  rippled  by  the 
morning  breeze,  at  the  field  of  yellowing  rye  on  the  opposite 
bank,  at  the  bright-red  morning  light  of  the  sun's  rays,  tingeing 
ever  lower  and  lower  the  white  trunks  of  the  birch  trees, 
which,  hiding  one  behind  the  other,  retreated  from  me  into 
the  depths  of  the  dense  forest;  and  I  enjoyed  the  consciousness 
within  myself  of  just  such  fresh  young  strength  of  life  as 
breathed  everywhere  from  the  nature  around  me.  When  in 
the  sky  there  were  gray  morning  cloudlets  and  I  was  chilled 
after  my  bath,  I  would  often  leave  the  path  and  set  to  wander- 
ing through  the  fields  and  woods,  and  with  a  feeling  of  delight 
would  wet  my  feet  through  my  boots  in  the  fresh  dew.  Mean- 
while I  dreamed  vividly  of  the  heroes  of  the  last  novel  that  I 
had  read,  and  imagined  myself  now  a  general,  now  a  minister 
of  state,  now  a  man  of  extraordinary  strength,  now  a  pas- 
sionate man,  and  with  a  sort  of  trembling  I  looked  ceaselessly 
around  in  the  hope  of  suddenly  meeting  her  somewhere  in  a 
glade  or  behind  a  tree. — [Youth,  ch.  32.1 

Here,  as  always,  Tolstoy  is  interested  in  life  itself  and 
not  in  the  pictures  that  can  be  made  of  it. 


28  TOLSTOY 

But  men  and  women  are  the  usual  subjects  of  Tolstoy's 
description.  By  an  unerring  instinct,  in  picturing  a 
scene  Tolstoy  selects  its  most  suggestive  features.  The 
traits  that  appeal  to  him  are  apparently  obvious,  so 
that  the  personality  of  the  writer  remains  unnoticed 
behind  his  work.  One  example  of  many  is  the  account 
of  how  the  half-witted  religious  mendicant  Grisha  pre- 
pares for  his  night's  rest,  watched  by  the  boys  who  have 
stolen  upstairs  before  him: 

After  praying  and  setting  his  staff  in  the  corner  he  looked  over 
his  bed  and  began  to  undress.  Ungirding  his  old  black  belt, 
he  slowly  took  off  his  torn  nankeen  frock,  carefully  folded  it 
and  hung  it  on  the  back  of  a  chair.  His  face  now  did  not  ex- 
press haste  and  stupidity,  as  it  usually  did;  on  the  contrary, 
he  was  calm,  reflective,  and  even  majestic.  His  motions  were 
slow  and  thoughtful. 

When  he  had  stripped  himself  to  his  underclothes,  he  slowly 
let  himself  down  on  the  bed,  made  the  sign  of  the  cross  over 
it  from  all  sides,  and,  evidently  with  an  effort  (because  he 
frowned),  he  adjusted  the  chains  under  his  shirt.  After  sitting 
a  short  time  and  carefully  looking  over  his  underclothes,  which 
were  torn  in  some  places,he  rose,  raised  the  candle  with  a  prayer 
to  the  level  of  the  shrine,  in  which  there  were  a  few  images, 
crossed  himself  before  them  and  turned  the  candle  wick  down. 
It  sputtered  and  went  out. 

Through  the  windows  that  faced  the  forest  shone  the  moon, 
now  almost  full.  The  tall  white  figure  of  the  mendicant  was 
lit  up  on  one  side  by  its  pale,  silvery  beams;  on  the  other  it 
cast  a  black  shadow,  which  fell,  along  with  the  shadows  from 
the  window  frames,  upon  the  floor  and  walls  and  reached  to 


I 


EARLY  WORKS  29 

the  celling.    In  the  yard  the  watchman  was  beating  on  his 
brass  plate. 

Folding  his  immense  arms  on  his  breast,  dropping  his  head, 
and  uttering  repeated  heavy  sighs,  Grisha  stood  silently 
before  the  holy  images,  then  with  an  effort  dropped  to  his 
knees  and  began  to  pray. — [Childhood,  eh.  12.] 

There  is  here  little  or  no  attempt  at  picturesque- 
ness;  the  details  are  such  as  might  impress  a  lad  crouch- 
ing in  the  dark.  But  they  are  so  selected  as  to  give  a 
striking  impression  of  reality.  Nor  do  they  cease  with 
this;  they  make  us  understand  the  perfect  sincerity 
and  the  unaffected  piety  of  the  pilgrim.  One  is  not  sur- 
prised when  a  moment  later  Tolstoy  exclaims  in  ad- 
miration: 

O  great  Christian  Grisha!  Thy  faith  was  so  strong  that 
thou  didst  feel  the  nearness  of  God;  thy  love  so  mighty  that 
the  words  flowed  of  themselves  from  thy  lips — thou  didst  not 

test  them  by  reason And  what  high  praise  didst  thou 

offer  to  His  might,  when,  finding  no  words,  thou  didst  prostrate 
thyself  on  the  floor  in  tears. 

At  a  later  period  Tolstoy  would  have  been  content  to 
let  his  picture  tell  its  own  story,  without  enforcing  its 
moral, or  at  all  events  would  have  combined  his  comments 
with  the  picture  instead  of  making  them  a  separate 
passage. 

Observation  of  detail  is  blended  with  a  boyish  shrewd- 
ness when  little  Nikolenka  comments  on  his  father's 
behavior  at  the  funeral  of  his  wife;    external   acts. 


30  TOLSTOY 

quite  innocent  in  themselves,  are  made  to  express  the 
vain  and  shallow  character  of  the  man: 

His  tall  figure  in  a  black  dress  coat,  his  pale,  expressive  face, 
and  his  movements,  graceful  and  self-confident  as  ever,  when 
he  crossed  himself,  bowed  down  and  touched  the  floor  with  his 
hand,  took  a  candle  from  the  hands  of  the  priest,  or  approached 
the  coflSn,  were  extraordinarily  effective;  but,  I  do  not  know 
why,  I  disliked  in  him  just  that  power  of  seeming  so  effective 
at  that  moment. — [Childhoody  ch.  27.] 

Running  parallel  with  this  emphasis  on  external 
reality  is  a  constant  analysis  of  the  narrator's  passing 
thoughts  and  feelings.  This  analysis  avoids  great  emo- 
tions, such  as  love,  hatred,  and  ambition,  and  lingers  over 
minor  sensations,  such  as  crowd  upon  each  of  us  at  every 
moment  of  our  lives.  Hence  comes  the  disconcerting 
realism  of  the  impression.  Tolstoy  reveals  to  each  reader 
the  petty  thoughts  and  emotions  that  he  has  himself 
experienced,  but  which  he  has  thought  were  his  peculiar 
property,  unknown  to  all  outsiders.  Nikolenka  is  stand- 
ing by  his  mother's  coffin,  bowed  by  the  deepest  grief 
of  his  boy's  life.  Yet  he  tells  us  less  of  this  great  sorrow 
than  of  the  different  cross  currents  of  feeling  that  in- 
cessantly crowd  upon  him: 

During  the  service  I  wept  decently,  crossed  myself,  and 
bowed  down  to  the  floor,  but  I  did  not  pray  with  my  soul,  and 
I  was  rather  indifferent;  I  was  troubled  because  the  little  new 
dress  coat  that  they  had  made  me  wear  was  very  tight  under 
the  arms,  I  was  careful  not  to  soil  over  much  the  knees  of 


EARLY  WORKS  31 

my  trousers,  and  I  stealthily  made  observations  on  all  who 
were  present. — [Childhood,  eh.  27.] 

Here  we  have  that  distrust  of  the  grand  style  in  dealing 
with  emotion  that  will  remain  with  Tolstoy  all  his  life. 
He  could  not  describe  himself  as  overwhelmed  by  grief 
without  departing  from  truth,  a  truth  that  every 
reader  will  confirm  by  his  own  experience.  And  to 
desert  truth,  to  be  insincere,  is  contrary  to  Tolstoy's 
nature. 

Tolstoy,  we  may  remark  in  passing,  may  have  been 
affected  by  a  paragraph  in  his  beloved  Rousseau: 

Plutarch  excels  by  the  very  details  into  which  we  no  longer 
dare  to  enter.  He  has  an  inimitable,  charming  art  of  painting 
great  men  in  little  things;  and  he  is  so  happy  in  the  choice  of 
his  traits  that  often  a  word,  a  smile,  a  gesture  suffices  him  for 
the  characterization  of  his  hero.  With  a  jesting  word  Hannibal 
reassures  his  frightened  army  and  makes  it  march  laughing  to 
the  battle  that  delivered  Italy  into  his  hands.  Agesilaus,  riding 
astride  a  stick,  makes  me  love  the  conqueror  of  the  great  king. 
Caesar,  while  passing  through  a  poor  village  and  chatting 
with  his  friends,  unconsciously  reveals  the  knave  who  said 
that  he  wished  to  be  merely  the  equal  of  Pompey.  Alexander 
swallows  a  medicine  without  saying  a  single  word;   it  is  the 

most  beautiful  moment  of  his  hfe There  is  the  true 

art  of  painting.  One's  physiognomy  is  not  shown  in  his  main 
features,  nor  one's  character  in  great  actions;  one's  true 
nature  shows  itself  in  trifles.  Public  acts  are  either  too  com- 
mon or  too  affected,  and  yet  it  is  only  on  them  that  our  modern 
dignity  permits  our  authors  to  linger. — [J^miley  book  iv.] 


S^  TOLSTOY 

Sincerity  was  indeed  Tolstoy's  idol.  A  trifling  in- 
cident in  the  tale  illustrates  his  worship  of  it.  On  grand- 
mother's name-day  each  of  the  children  is  supposed  to 
come  to  her  with  his  congratulations  and  some  small 
gift.  Nikolenka  decides  that,  like  his  tutor  Karl  Mauer, 
he  will  write  a  poem  in  honor  of  his  grandmother.  His 
doggerel  ends  with  the  lines: 

We'll  never  trouble — do  not  fear; 
We  love  you  like  our  mother  dear. 

[Childhood,  ch.  16.1 

The  last  verse,  despite  the  fact  that  it  rimed  correctly, 
distressed  its  small  author: 

Why  did  I  write,  ** like  our  mother  dear"?  She  was  not  here, 
and  so  I  ought  not  even  to  have  mentioned  her.  To  be  sure, 
I  love  grandmother  and  respect  her,  but  still  she  is  not  the 
same. — Why  did  I  write  that?  Why  did  I  lie?  To  be  sure, 
those  are  verses,  but  still  I  ought  not  to  have  done  so. 

This  passage  gives  a  foretaste  of  the  thinker  who,  as  we 
have  seen,  later  condemned  all  metrical  composition  as 
involving  a  sacrifice  of  truth,  and  who  came  to  reject 
beauty  as  an  essential  element  in  art. 

As  the  tale  advances  and  Nikolenka  becomes  a  uni- 
versity student,  his  meditations  on  life's  problems  grow 
more  and  more  important.  A  chapter  on  Dreams  tells 
of  his  aspirations  for  moral  purity  and  perfection: 

"Today  I  shall  confess  and  purify  myself  of  all  my  sins,"  I 
thought,  "and  I  shall  no  longer — '*  (Here  I  called  to  mind 
all  the  sins  that  most  tortured  me.)    "Every  Sunday  I  shall 


EARLY  WORKS  88 

go  to  church  without  fail,  and  later  I  shall  read  the  Gospel  for  a 
whole  hour;  then  out  of  the  twenty-five  ruble  note  that  I  shall 
receive  monthly  when  I  enter  the  university  I  shall  invariably 
give  two  and  a  half  (a  tithe)  to  the  poor,  and  in  such  a  way 
that  nobody  will  know  of  it — and  not  to  beggars  either;  I 
will  look  up  poor  people,  an  orphan  or  an  old  woman,  of  whom 
no  one  knows." — [Youthy  ch.  3.] 

These  resolves  are  set  down  with  a  full  consciousness 
that  they  are  mawkish  and  calfish.  Crude  and  im- 
mature though  they  be,  they  are  sincere,  not  a  pose 
assumed  before  the  world  in  obedience  to  others'  pre- 
cepts. Despite  continual  stumbling  and  faltering, 
Tolstoy  is  striving  to  follow  a  moral  ideal.  With  a 
prophetic  voice  he  adds: 

Let  no  one  reproach  me  with  the  fact  that  the  dreams  of 
my  youth  were  just  as  infantile  as  the  dreams  of  my  childhood 
and  boyhood.  I  am  convinced  that  if  I  am  fated  to  live  to 
extreme  old  age,  and  my  tale  overtakes  my  years,  as  an  old 
man  of  seventy  I  shall  indulge  in  the  same  impossible,  childish 
dreams  as  now.  .  .  . 

Beneficent,  consoling  voice,  which  since  then  so  often,  in 
those  sad  times  when  my  soul  silently  submitted  to  the  power 
of  life's  lies  and  corruption,  hast  boldly  revolted  against  all 
untruth,  hast  bitterly  reproached  the  past,  hast  pointed  out 
and  forced  me  to  love  the  bright  point  of  the  present,  and 
hast  promised  good  and  happiness  in  the  future — beneficent, 
consoling  voice!    Wilt  thou  ever  cease  to  be  heard? 

These  resolves  and  aspirations  are  unaffected  by  any 
definite  religious  beliefs.    Tolstoy  is  interested  only  in 


S4  TOLSTOY 

the  life  here  on  earth.  Though  he  is  not  quite  an  ag- 
nostic, he  shows  in  this  book  no  active  acceptance  even 
of  so  vague  a  creed  as  that  of  his  belov  d  Rousseau,  who 
prescribed  faith  in  an  all-wise  and  all-beneficent  deity 
and  in  a  future  state  of  rewards  and  punishments. 
Perhaps  for  this  reason,  he  emphasizes  far  less  his  re- 
morse for  the  past  than  his  aspirations  for  the  future. 
Except  in  his  last  years,  Tolstoy  was  not  given  to  brood- 
ing over  past  sins;  the  Calvinistic  atmosphere  of  The 
Scarlet  Letter  is  wholly  alien  to  his  spirit,  as  it  is  to 
that  of  the  whole  Russian  people.*  From  this  calm 
indifference  to  dogma  Tolstoy  never  really  departed; 
though  he  ultimately  reached  a  faith  in  a  temporal  life 
after  death  he  remained  indifferent  to  speculations  as 
to  its  nature.  Of  Natalya  Savishna  he  here  remarks: 
"She  performed  the  best  and  greatest  act  of  this  life — 
she  died  without  regret  and  fear."t  Though  death 
never  ceased  to  be  a  controlling  motive  in  his  thought, 
Tolstoy  at  last  found  other  acts  better  and  greater  than 
"a  death  without  regret  and  fear." 

A  somber  tone  runs  through  even  this  youthful  work. 
The  boy  narrator  sees  clearly  the  frailties  of  his  father 
and  brother,  of  his  stepmother,  of  his  university  com- 
rades, of  the  high  society  in  Moscow  to  which  he  belongs. 
To  this  world  one  may  apply  what  he  wrote  at  about  the 
same  time  in  Sevastopol  in  May,  1855: 

*  Stephen  Graham,  in  The  Way  of  Martha  and  the  Way  of  Mary, 
pp.  155-160,  comments  excellently  on  this  national  trait, 
t  Childhood,  ch.  28. 


EARLY  WORKS  $5 

Vanity,  vanity,  vanity  everywhere,  even  on  the  brink  of 
the  grave  and  among  men  ready  to  die  in  behalf  of  lofty  con- 
victions. Vanity!  This  must  be  the  characteristic  trait  and 
peculiar  malady  of  our  age.  Why  among  men  of  former  days 
was  there  nothing  heard  of  this  passion,  as  of  the  smallpox  or 
the  cholera?  Why  in  our  age  are  there  only  three  sorts  of  men: 
some  who  accept  the  principle  of  vanity  as  a  fact  inevitably 
existing  and  therefore  just,  and  who  freely  submit  to  it;  others 
who  accept  it  as  an  unfortunate  but  insurmountable  condition; 
and  still  others  who  with  unconscious  servility  act  under  its 
influence?  Why  did  the  Homers  and  Shakespeares  speak  of 
love,  glory,  and  sufferings,  while  the  literature  of  our  time  is 
only  an  endless  tale  of  Snobs  and  vanity? — [Ch.  3.] 

This  emphasis  on  pretence  and  conceit,  whether 
conscious  or  unconscious,  at  times  gives  to  the  book  a 
cynical  tone  that  suggests  Vanity  Fair.  But  there  is  a 
fundamental  difference.  Thackeray  plays  the  part  of 
a  showman,  glorifying  in  the  cleverness  with  which  he 
detects  the  frailty  of  the  puppets  whom  he  moves  across 
his  stage;  Tolstoy  is  a  part  of  the  vain  world  that  he  is 
describing,  and  emphasizes  his  own  vanities  quite  as 
much  as  those  of  his  fellows.  His  most  incisive  satire 
on  petty  social  failings  is  his  account  of  his  own  efforts 
to  be  in  every  way  comme  ilfaut. 

Yet  vanity  is  not  quite  an  all-pervading  element  in 
Tolstoy's  characters.  To  his  mother  Nikolenka  never 
attributes  it;  the  little  boy's  love  for  her  will  not  allow 
him  to  see  any  defects  that  she  may  possess.  Nor  does 
vanity  affect  the  humbler  people  of  the  story,  such  as 
the  housekeeper  Natalya  Savishna  and  the  half-witted 


36  TOLSTOY 

mendicant  Grisha.  These  persons  act  from  no  desire 
to  be  seen  of  men;  Natalya  Savishna  husbands  the 
master's  sugar  and  Grisha,  clad  in  clanking  chains,  prays 
to  God,  from  an  inborn  moral  sense.  In  a  word,  the 
tone  of  the  book  is  democratic;  the  true  moral  life  is 
found  only  among  men  and  women  of  low  estate. 

Later  in  his  life  Tolstoy  condemned  this  early  work  as 
insincere  and  affected.  His  judgment  is  so  remarkable 
that  it  must  be  quoted  entire : 

I  have  re-read  them  [Childhood,  Boyhood,  and  Youth]  and 
regret  that  I  wrote  them;  so  ill,  artificially  and  insincerely  are 
they  penned.  It  could  not  be  otherwise:  first,  because  what 
I  aimed  at  was  not  to  write  my  own  history  but  that  of  the 
friends  of  my  youth,  and  this  produced  an  awkward  mixture 
of  the  facts  of  their  and  my  own  childhood;  and  secondly,  be- 
cause at  the  time  I  wrote  it  I  was  far  from  being  independent 
in  my  way  of  expressing  myself,  being  strongly  influenced  by 
two  writers:  Sterne  (his  Sentimental  Journey)  and  Topffer 
(his  Bibliotheque  de  Mon  Oncle). 

I  am  now  specially  dissatisfied  with  the  two  last  parts. 
Boyhood  and  Youth,  in  which  besides  an  awkward  mixture  of 
truth  and  invention,  there  is  also  insincerity;  a  desire  to  put 
forward  as  good  and  important  what  I  did  not  then  consider 
good  and  important,  namely,  my  democratic  tendency. — 
[Quoted  by  Maude:  I,  160.1 

This  harsh  verdict  is  by  no  means  just.  An  aristocrat 
by  breeding,  Tolstoy  always  wavered  between  caste 
prejudice  and  the  rejection  of  it.  The  democratic  sym- 
pathies of  his  early  book  are  like  its  austere  moralizing. 


EARLY  WORKS  37 

not  insincere,  but  an  ideal  which  the  author  could  not 
realize  in  his  daily  life  and  to  which  even  his  affections 
could  not  be  constant. 

It  is  noteworthy  that  in  his  literary  work  Tolstoy 
speaks  almost  invariably  from  his  best  self;  not  as  a  prig, 
but  as  a  man  of  fervent  moral  aspirations,  for  whom 
conduct  is  nine  tenths  of  life.  Only  rarely  does  he  ex- 
press the  unregenerate  side  of  his  nature.  In  The  Two 
Hussars  (1856)  he  shows  a  frank  preference  for  an  ener- 
getic, vigorous  rake  over  his  cool,  business-like  son;  to 
wrong-doing  that  springs  from  animal  strength  or  from 
easy-going  kindliness  he  is  always  charitable,  while  for 
calculating  selfishness  he  has  an  unfailing  contempt. 
His  scorn  of  the  student  carousal  in  Youth  is  due  to  the 
fact  that  it  was  undertaken  in  mere  obedience  to  fashion. 
Only  in  two  tales.  An  Idyl,  and  Tikhon  and  Malanya* 
which  he  himself  suppressed,  but  which  have  appeared  in 
his  posthumous  works,  does  he  show  a  cynical  point  of 
view.  This  high  seriousness  of  Tolstoy's  artistic  work 
is  at  the  other  pole  from  hypocrisy.  Mr.  Sellar  has 
admirably  stated  the  true  explanation: 

Differing  infinitely,  as  they  may  do,  from  one  another  in 
powers  of  self-control  and  obedience  to  their  higher  instincts, 
the  greatest  poets  and  artists  have  one  quality  in  common — 
absolute  sincerity  of  nature.  They  give  the  world  of  their 
strongest  and  best,  not  because  they  wish  to  be  thought  other 
than  they  are,  but  because  it  is  their  strongest  and  best  self 
which  alone  deeply  interests  them  and  demands  expres- 
*  Neither  has  been  translated  into  English,  so  far  as  the  writer  is  aware. 


38  TOLSTOY 

sion. — [The  Roman  Poets  of  the  Augustan  Age:  Virgil  (Oxford, 
1877),  p.  94.] 

While  Tolstoy  was  serving  in  the  Caucasus  important 
events  had  been  taking  place  in  Europe.  In  November, 
1853,  Russia  had  declared  war  on  Turkey,  and  the 
Russians  immediately  began  an  invasion  of  the  Danube 
principalities.  Early  in  the  next  year  Tolstoy  received 
his  commission  as  an  oflBcer  in  the  army,  went  home  for 
a  short  furlough,  and  joined  the  Russian  forces  in 
Bucharest  in  March,  1854.  When  they  were  forced  to 
retreat  he  asked  to  be  sent  to  the  Crimea,  where  he  ar- 
rived in  November  and  was  assigned  to  the  artillery 
service.  The  siege  of  Sevastopol  by  the  French  and  Eng- 
lish began  in  October  of  that  year  and  continued  until 
\  September,  1855.  Tolstoy  served  throughout  the  siege 
in  various  positions.  During  April  and  May,  1855,  he 
was  at  intervals  in  charge  of  the  battery  on  the  Fourth 
Bastion,  one  of  the  most  dangerous  positions  in  the 
fortress.  From  here  he  was  transferred  to  Belbek,  four- 
teen miles  from  Sevastopol,  in  consequence,  it  is  said, 
of  the  personal  instructions  of  the  Emperor  Alexander 
II,  who  had  been  so  impressed  by  the  reading  of  Sevas- 
topol in  December,  1854,  that  he  gave  order  to  take 
care  of  the  author  and  remove  him  from  the  place  of 
danger.*  His  promotion  in  the  service  was  hindered 
by  some  doggerel  verses  for  the  composition  of  which 
he  was  partially  responsible,  and  probably  also  by  the 

*Biryuk6v:  1,259, 


EARLY  WORKS  39 

displeasure  of  his  superiors  at  his  meticulous  honesty 
in  regard  to  the  government  money.*  At  the  con- 
clusion of  the  siege  he  was  sent  to  St.  Petersburg  as  a 
courier  and  never  returned  to  the  army,  from  which 
he  formally  retired  in  November,  1856. 

The  literary  result  of  Tolstoy's  experience  of  the 
great  siege  was  three  sketches  published  under  the 
title,  Sevastopol  in  December ,  1854,  cmd  in  May  and 
August,  1855.  The  first  of  these,  composed  soon  after 
his  arrival  in  the  beleaguered  fortress,  is  marked  by  a 
patriotic  enthusiasm  strongly  at  variance  with  his  later 
convictions,  but  which  may  be  seen  to  be  genuine,  not 
a  literary  pose,  from  its  agreement  with  the  author's 
private  letters  written  at  this  same  time.  "The  spirit 
of  our  armies  is  above  all  description,"  he  wrote  to  his 
brother  on  December  2,  1854.  "In  the  days  of  ancient 
Greece  there  was  never  such  heroism."  Yet  even  in  the 
first  sketch  Tolstoy  is  impressed  by  the  quiet,  un- 
assuming courage  with  which  the  Russian  army  endures 
hardships,  not  by  its  aggressive  bravery.  In  the  next 
sketch  the  atmosphere  has  changed.  Petty  vanity  I 
Tolstoy  now  finds  to  be  the  master  passion  of  the  / 
Russian  officers  in  the  field,  as  of  their  brothers  at 
home : 

Kalugin  and  the  Colonel  would  have  been  ready  every  day 

to  see  just  such  an  affair  in  order  each  time  to  receive  a  gold 

saber  and  the  rank  of  major-general,  notwithstanding  the  fact 

that  they  were  fine  fellows.    I  like  to  hear  people  give  the 

*  His  attitude  is  reflected  in  Sevastopol  in  August,  1855,  ch.  18. 


40  TOLSTOY 

name  of  monster  to  some  conqueror  or  other,  who  destroys 
millions  for  the  sake  of  his  own  ambition.  But  demand  a 
frank  confession  from  Ensign  Petrushov,  Sub-Lieutenant 
Antonov  and  their  comrades:  every  one  of  us  is  a  Uttle  Na- 
poleon, a  little  monster,  and  is  ready  to  start  a  battle  at  once, 
to  slay  a  hundred  men,  merely  in  order  to  receive  an  extra 
decoration  or  a  third  more  salary. — [Sevastopol  in  Maijy  1855, 
ch.  15.] 

In  the  third  sketch  the  patriotic  tone  in  a  measure 
returns.  Speaking  generally,  one  has  to  exercise  some 
care  in  the  interpretation  of  these  works  from  this 
point  of  view.  The  censor  seriously  mangled  the  sec- 
ond of  them,  perhaps  the  others  also,  before  publica- 
tion; and  Tolstoy  himself  later  confessed  "that,  con- 
tending with  his  desire  to  tell  the  truth  about  things 
as  he  saw  it,  he  was  at  the  same  time  aware  of  another 
feeling  prompting  him  to  say  what  was  expected  of  him."* 

Though  the  literary  characteristics  of  Sevastopol 
are,  when  analyzed,  the  same  as  those  of  Childhood,  the 
book  made  a  far  stronger  impression  because  of  the  tre- 
mendous appeal  of  its  subject.  Tolstoy  saw  war  as 
suffering  and  death,  unrelieved  by  any  touch  of  bril- 
liancy or  grandeur,  and  he  selected  just  the  right  detail 
to  convey  his  impression : 

Now,  if  your  nerves  are  strong,  enter  the  door  at  the  left; 

in  that  room  they  bandage  wounds  and  perform  operations. 

You  will  see  there  doctors  with  arms  covered  with  blood  up 

to  their  elbows  and  with  pale,  gloomy  faces,  busy  around  a 

*  Maude:  1,134. 


EARLY  WORKS  41 

bed  on  which,  with  eyes  open  and  speaking,  as  if  in  delirium, 
disconnected  but  often  simple  and  touching  words,  lies  a 
wounded  man  under  the  influence  of  chloroform.  The  doctors 
are  occupied  with  the  horrible  but  beneficent  act  of  amputa- 
tion. You  will  see  how  the  sharp,  curved  knife  enters  the  white, 
healthy  body;  you  will  see  how  with  an  awful,  piercing  cry 
and  with  curses  the  wounded  man  suddenly  comes  to  his 
senses;  you  will  see  how  the  surgeon  tosses  into  the  comer  the 
severed  arm;  you  will  see  how  on  a  stretcher  in  the  same  room 
there  lies  another  wounded  man,  who,  gazing  at  the  operation 
performed  on  his  companion,  writhes  and  groans,  not  so 
much  from  physical  pain  as  from  the  moral  torments  of  ex- 
pectation. You  will  see  awful  sights  that  rend  your  soul;  you 
will  see  war,  not  in  regular,  beautiful,  and  brilliant  ranks, 
with  music  and  the  beating  of  drums,  with  waving  banners 
and  generals  on  prancing  steeds — ^you  will  see  war  in  its  true 
expression,  in  blood,  in  sufferings,  in  death. — [Sevastopol  in 
December y  1854,  ch.  1.] 

Tolstoy  agrees  with  General  Sherman  that  "war  is 
hell."  Yet  he  does  not  revel  in  descriptions  of  carnage 
and  cruelty;  his  atmosphere  is  not  that  of  the  romantic 
Sienkiewicz.  The  force  of  the  book  depends  on  its 
reserve,  on  the  sense  of  restraint  and  seK-mastery  that 
makes  every  word  ring  true. 

In  Sevastopol  the  psychological  analysis  characteristic 
of  Tolstoy's  first  published  work  passes  to  a  somewhat 
broader  field.  No  longer  checked  by  an  autobiographic 
form,  Tolstoy  tells  of  the  thoughts  and  feelings  of 
different  officers  who  fight  and  die  for  their  country. 
One  remarks  the  same  trait  as  before,  the  absence  of 


42  TOLSTOY 

great,  controlling  passions,  such  as  patriotic  enthusiasm 
and  self-sacrifice.  Ambition  there  is,  but  of  a  petty 
sort.  Tolstoy  does  not  shrink  from  portraying  the 
sensations  of  an  officer  during  his  last  moments;  the 
man  is  petty  even  in  death: 

Praskukhin,  closing  his  eyes  tight,  heard  how  the  bomb 
plumped  down  on  the  hard  ground  somewhere  very  near  him. 
A  second  passed,  which  seemed  an  hour — the  bomb  had  not 
burst.  Praskukhin  was  afraid  lest  he  might  have  played  the 
coward  for  nothing;  perhaps  the  bomb  had  fallen  far  away, 
and  it  only  seemed  to  him  that  the  fuse  was  liissing  just  be- 
side him.  He  opened  his  eyes  and  noticed  with  pleasure  that 
Mikhaylov  was  lying  motionless  on  the  earth  right  near  his 
feet.  But  here  his  eyes  encountered  for  a  moment  the  glowing 
fuse  of  the  bomb,  which  was  spinning  around  less  than  a  yard 
away  from  him. 

Horror,  cold  horror,  which  excluded  all  other  thoughts  and 
feelings,  seized  his  whole  being.  He  covered  his  face  with  his 
hands. 

A  second  more  passed,  a  second  in  which  a  whole  world  of 
feelings,  thoughts,  hopes,  and  memories  flashed  through  his 
imagination. 

"Whom  will  it  kill,  me  or  Mikhaylov?  or  both  of  us  to- 
gether? And  if  me,  then  where?  If  it's  in  the  head,  then 
I'm  done  for;  but  if  it's  in  the  leg,  then  they'll  cut  it  off  and 
I'll  ask  'em  to  be  sure  to  use  chloroform — and  I  may  still  sur- 
vive. But  perhaps  it  will  kill  only  Mikhaylov — then  I  will 
tell  how  we  were  walking  together,  how  he  was  killed  and  I  was 
spattered  with  his  blood.    No,  it's  nearer  to  me;  it  will  be  I." 

Then  he  remembered  the  twelve  rubles  that  he  owed 
Mikhaylov,  and  he  remembered   still  another  debt  in  St. 


^jM- 


EARLY  WORKS  43 

Petersburg,  which  he  ought  to  have  paid  long  ago;  the  gypsy 
air  that  he  liad  sung  the  evening  before  came  into  his  head. 
The  woman  whom  he  loved  appeared  before  his  imagination, 
wearing  a  cap  with  purple  ribbons;  he  remembered  a  man 
who  had  insulted  him  five  years  before  and  whom  he  had  not 
paid  back  for  the  insult,  although  at  the  same  time,  inseparable 
from  this  and  from  thousands  of  other  recollections,  the  feeling 
of  the  present,  the  expectation  of  death,  did  not  for  a  moment 
abandon  him. — [Sevastopol  in  Maj/y  1855,  ch.  12.] 

Military  heroism  plays  small  part  in  these  pages. 
OflScers  show  their  indifference  to  danger  by  walking 
upright  along  the  shallow  trenches;  but,  when  they 
feel  themselves  free  from  observation,  they  are  glad  to 
crawl  on  all  fours.  Even  deeds  of  valor  are  performed 
half  unconsciously,  by  a  blind  following  of  the  crowd  in 
a  night  sally. 

From  the  ever-present  vanity  of  the  oflScers  the 
common  soldiers  are  exempt.  In  war  as  in  peace  these 
men  of  humbler  station  do  their  work  willingly  and 
unassumingly.  Submitting  to  destiny,  without  thought 
of  their  personal  life,  by  their  very  submission  they 
are  the  only  true  heroes: 

"Really,  there  seem  to  be  altogether  too  many  men  return- 
ing," said  Galtsin,  stopping  again  the  same  tall  soldier  with  tlie 
two  muskets.  "What  are  you  coming  this  way  for?  Hey,  you, 
halt!" 

The  soldier  halted  and  took  off  his  hat  with  his  left  hand. 

"Where  are  you  going  and  why?"  Galtsin  shouted  at 
him  sternly.    "You  scoun — " 


44  TOLSTOY 

But  meanwhile  he  had  come  up  close  to  the  soldier  and  had 
noticed  that  no  hand  could  be  seen  behind  his  right  cuff  and 
that  the  sleeve  was  soaked  with  blood  to  a  point  above  the 
elbow. 

"Wounded,  your  honor!'* 

"How?" 

"Here,  most  likely  with  a  bullet,"  said  the  soldier,  pointing 
to  his  arm.  "But  I  can't  tell  what  struck  my  head."  And, 
bending  forward  his  head,  he  showed  the  hair  matted  to- 
gether with  blood  on  the  back  of  his  neck. 

"And  whose  is  the  second  gun?" 

"A  French  musket,  your  honor!  I  captured  it.  But  I 
shouldn't  have  left,  if  it  weren't  to  help  this  little  fellow;  other- 
wise he'd  fall,"  he  added,  pointing  to  a  soldier  walking  a  little 
in  front  of  him,  who  was  leaning  on  his  gun  and  painfully 
dragging  along  his  left  leg. 

Prince  Galtsin  suddenly  felt  frightfully  ashamed  of  his 
unjust  suspicions.  He  felt  himself  blushing,  and,  without  ask- 
ing further  questions  of  the  wounded  or  watching  them,  he 
walked  to  the  field  hospital. — [Sevastopol  in  May,  1855,  ch.  7.1 

In  the  third  part  of  his  work,  Sevastopol  in  August, 
1855,  however,  Tolstoy  definitely  changes  his  tone,  no 
longer  emphasizing  the  vanity  of  the  officers,  but  showing 
us  in  the  brothers  Kozeltsov  two  men  who  are  animated  by 
self-sacrificing  gallantry  and  devotion  to  their  country. 

In  Sevastopol,  just  as  in  his  previous  work,  Childhood, 
sincerity  is  the  keynote  of  Tolstoy's  writing,  and  truth 
is  his  divinity: 

There,  this  time  I  have  said  what  I  wished  to  say.  But  a 
painful  hesitation  overcomes  me.    Perhaps  I  ought  not  to  have 


EARLY  WORKS  45 

said  this;  perhaps  what  I  have  said  is  one  of  those  evil  truths, 
which,  unconsciously  concealed  in  the  soul  of  each  man,  ought 
not  to  be  expressed,  in  order  not  to  become  harmful,  like  the 
dregs  of  wine, which  must  not  be  shaken,in  order  not  to  spoil  it. 

Where  is  the  expression  of  evil,  which  must  be  avoided? 
Where  in  this  tale  is  the  expression  of  good,  which  must  be 
imitated?  Who  is  its  villain  and  who  its  hero?  All  are  good  and 
all  are  bad. 

Neither  Kalugin  with  his  brilliant  bravery — bravoure  de 
gentilhomme — and  the  vanity  that  animates  his  every  act,  nor 
Praskukhin,an  empty,  harmless  fellow, though  he  fell  in  combat 
for  faith,  throne,  and  fatherland,  nor  Mikhaylov  with  his 
shyness,  nor  Pest,  a  child  without  firm  convictions  and  rules 
of  action,  can  be  either  the  villain  or  the  hero  of  the  tale. 

The  hero  of  my  tale,  whom  I  love  with  all  the  strength  of 
my  soul,  whom  I  have  tried  to  reproduce  in  all  his  beauty,  and 
who  always  has  been,  is,  and  will  be  beautiful — is  the  truth. — 
[Sevastopol  in  May,  1855,  ch.  16.] 

No  hatred  of  French  or  English  is  seen  in  these  sketches 
even  among  the  oJEcers,  still  less  among  the  private 
soldiers,  who  fraternize  in  the  most  friendly  fashion  with 
their  French  opponents,  whose  language  they  do  not 
understand. 

Sevastopol  treats  of  a  great  war,  involving  important 
issues  of  European  politics,  and  of  movements  of  large 
armies,  involving  carefully  planned  mass  action.  In  all 
this  Tolstoy  shows  no  interest  whatever.  He  is  occupied 
with  the  individual  officer  and  soldier,  with  his  life  as 
determined  by  the  crushing,  revolting  circumstances 
in  which  he  is  placed;   into  the  cause  of  those  circum- 


46  TOLSTOY 

stances  he  does  not  inquire.  For  Tolstoy  in  a  certain 
sense  each  man  Hveth  unto  himself  and  dieth  unto  him- 
seK;  the  private  moral  life  is  man's  sole  concern.  He 
exclaims  in  sadness: 

Yes,  on  the  bastion  and  in  the  trench  white  flags  are  raised, 
the  flowery  valley  is  filled  with  dead  bodies,  the  fair  sun 
descends  towards  the  blue  sea,  and  the  blue  sea,  rippling, 
glitters  in  the  golden  beams  of  the  sun.  Thousands  of  men 
crowd  about,  gaze,  talk,  and  smile  to  one  another.  And  will 
not  these  men.  Christians  who  profess  the  one  great  law  of  love 
and  self-sacrifice,  when  they  gaze  on  what  they  have  done,  fall 
suddenly  on  their  knees  in  repentance  before  Him  who,  when 
He  gave  them  life,  implanted  in  the  soul  of  each  man,  along 
with  the  fear  of  death,  the  love  for  the  good  and  the  beautiful; 
and  will  they  not  embrace  like  brothers?  The  white  flags  are 
lowered,  again  the  engines  of  death  and  suffering  whistle, 
again  innocent  blood  is  shed  and  groans  and  curses  are  heard. — 
[Sevastopol  in  May,  1855,  ch.  16.] 

This  passage  testifies  to  the  fundamentally  religious 
nature  of  the  gay  young  officer  who  was  "the  soul  of 
his  battery,"*  and  who  at  times  could  sink  to  coarse 
dissipation.  An  entry  in  Tolstoy's  diary  in  March, 
1855,  speaks  even  more  clearly  of  his  inner  life: 

A  conversation  about  divinity  and  faith  has  led  to  a  great, 
stupendous  thought,  to  the  realization  of  which  I  feel  myself 
capable  of  consecrating  my  life.    This  thought  is  the  founda- 
tion of  a  new  religion,  corresponding  to  the  development  of 
*  Quoted  by  Biryukov:  I,  256. 


EARLY  WORKS  47 

humanity,  the  religion  of  Christ  purified  of  faith  and  mystery, 
a  practical  religion,  not  promising  future  blessedness,  but 
giving  blessedness  on  earth.  This  thought  can  be  realized,  I 
understand,  only  by  generations  consciously  working  towards 
that  aim.  One  generation  will  bequeath  this  thought  to  the 
following,  and  at  some  time  fanaticism  or  reason  will  realize 
it.  To  act  consciously  towards  the  uniting  of  men  by  rehgion, 
that  is  the  foundation  of  the  thought  which,  I  hope,  will  draw 
me  on. — [Biryuk6v:  I,  250.1 

No  man  had  previously  written  of  war  in  such  style 
as  Tolstoy.  To  be  sure,  Tolstoy  himself,  with  his  fre- 
quent exaggeration  when  speaking  of  his  debt  to  others, 
has  said  that  he  learned  from  StendhaFs  Chartretise  de 
Parme  all  that  he  knew  of  war.*  The  picture  of  the 
perplexed  Fabrice,  full  of  Napoleonic  enthusiasm,  riding 
over  the  battlefield  of  Waterloo  and  totally  failing 
to  understand  what  is  happening  all  about  him,  is 
indeed  somewhat  in  the  vein  of  Tolstoy,  but  is  far  more 
pale  and  vague.  Despite  what  he  may  have  learned 
from  such  a  predecessor,  Tolstoy  is  in  Sevastopol  even 
more  independent  than  in  Childhood,  Other  writers, 
from  Homer  to  Scott,  had  taken  the  point  of  view  of 
the  slayer,  or  perhaps  that  of  the  slain  man's  wife  and 
comrades;  Tolstoy  dwells  on  the  feelings  of  the  man 
who  is  being  killed,  whether  swiftly  on  the  field  of 
battle,  or  by  a  lingering  death  in  the  hospital,  or  by 
still  slower  tortures  in  a  besieged  town,  awaiting  his 
turn  in  the  trenches.  This  book  alone  would  suffice 
*  Quoted  by  Biryukov:  I,  270. 


48  TOLSTOY 

to  establish  its  author's  fame.  Its  effect  on  Russian 
pubhc  opinion  has  been  considerable.  War  has  come 
to  be  regarded  in  Russia,  perhaps  more  than  elsewhere, 
as  blood,  suffering,  and  death,  rather  than  as  a  glorious 
field  of  heroic  combat.  Russians  no  longer  write  of 
war  in  the  tone  of  their  romantic  poets,  Pushkin  and 
Lermontov.  Men  of  talent,  such  as  Garshin  and 
Andreyev,  have  followed  in  the  footsteps  of  Tolstoy,  but 
without  equaling  his  quiet  mastery  of  reserve  force. 
Andreyev  in  The  Red  Laugh,  though  he  uses  a  hundred- 
fold more  lurid  tints  than  Tolstoy,  succeeds  in  making 
war  grotesque  rather  than  terrible. 

Nor  has  Tolstoy's  influence  been  confined  to  his 
own  country.  When  we  read  his  book  today,  fresh 
from  the  stories  of  the  European  war  as  related  by  the 
newspaper  correspondents  and  the  wounded  com- 
batants, it  seems  far  less  unique  than  it  did  at  the  time 
of  its  first  appearance.  A  change  has  indeed  come  over 
the  whole  style  of  the  descriptions  of  war,  and  among 
those  responsible  for  that  change  no  single  man  was  of 
more  influence  than  Leo  Tolstoy. 

Meanwhile  Tolstoy's  life  in  the  Caucasus  had  ap- 
parently passed  without  direct  reflection  in  his  work,  ex- 
cept for  some  short  sketches  such  as  The  Incursion 
(1852).  In  reality  he  had  as  early  as  1852  begun  a 
story  based  on  his  life  there,*  and  in  particular  on  his 
passing  infatuation  for  a  Cossack  girl.    This  he  took  up 

*  See  note  by  Chertk6v  in  The  Diaries  of  Leo  Tolstoy:  Youth,  m7-52 
(New  York,  1917),  p.  115. 


EARLY  WORKS  49 

once  more  in  I860,*  and  in  1862,  in  order  to  satisfy 
a  gambling  debt  to  the  editor  Katkov,  he  gave  him  the 
book,  still  unfinished.  Owing  to  the  unpleasant  memories 
connected  with  the  novel,  which  was  published  under 
the  title  The  Cossacks,  he  never  brought  it  to  comple- 
tion. 

The  Cossacks  is  Tolstoy's  first  attempt  at  a  novel  with 
a  regular  plot.  Olenin,  a  young  Russian  tired  of  civilized 
life  in  Moscow,  enters  military  service  with  the  troops 
stationed  on  the  Caucasus  frontier,  among  the  Grebensky 
Cossacks.  He  lodges  at  the  house  of  an  old  ensign, 
whose  daughter  Maryana  straightway  attracts  his  at- 
tention. Introspective  and  self-conscious,  Olenin  cannot 
flirt  and  frolic  with  the  peasant  girls  as  does  his  thought- 
less comrade  Beletsky.  He  meditates  becoming  a 
Cossack,  marrying  Maryana,  and  abandoning  all  con- 
nection with  his  old  life.  Maryana,  though  attached  to 
the  bold  young  Cossack  Lukashka,  seems  for  a  time 
to  encourage  his  attentions.  Then  Lukashka  is  killed 
in  a  combat  with  some  Circassian  raiders.  When  Olenin 
attempts  to  approach  Maryana  with  words  of  tenderness, 
she  drives  him  from  her  in  a  burst  of  fury  and  contempt. 
Defeated  and  dejected,  Olenin  returns  home. 

No  book  could  be  more  utterly  unheroic  and  un- 
romantic.  Yet  Tolstoy  had  been  living  amid  the  most 
splendid  mountain  scenery,  and  amid  the  same  wild, 
half-savage  life  that  had  inspired  Pushkin  and  Ler- 
montov  to  their  most  typically  romantic  poems.  Push- 
♦Biryukdv:  I,  354. 


50  TOLSTOY 

kin,  in  fact,  had  in  his  Prisoner  of  the  Caucasus  written 
a  work  that  is  the  exact  converse  of  Tolstoy's.  A 
gloomy,  disenchanted  young  Russian  officer  is  captured 
by  the  Circassians.  A  fair  Circassian  maiden  solaces 
his  imprisonment  and  proffers  him  her  love,  but  he 
replies  that  the  springs  of  tender  feeling  are  quenched 
within  him.  Thereupon  the  maiden  brings  a  file,  sets 
the  somber  hero  free,  and,  once  he  is  safe  across  the 
boundary  stream,  drowns  herself  in  its  depths. 

The  contrast  between  these  two  works  is  impressive. 
Pushkin  sketches  for  us  two  vague,  shadowy  beings, 
who  owe  their  existence  largely  to  the  poems  of  Byron; 
Tolstoy  draws  a  man  and  woman  who  are  perfectly  real 
and  concrete.  His  Olenin,  though  no  coward,  is  far 
from  brilliant  and  dashing;  once  when  he  is  surprised 
at  nighttime  listening  by  Maryana's  window  he  becomes 
actually  ludicrous:  in  a  word,  he  is  Tolstoy  himself, 
with  all  his  doubts  and  perplexities,  stumblings  and 
failures.  Maryana,  though  chaste  and  pure,  is  far 
from  ethereal;  she  is  a  good  hand  at  shoveling  dung, 
and  is  not  averse  to  being  kissed  by  her  lover  or,  on 
occasion,  by  others  as  well.  In  contrast  to  Pushkin's 
eloquent  and  poetic  heroine,  she  is  monosyllabic  of 
speech;  when  embarrassed,  she  is  given  to  hiding  her 
face  behind  her  broad  sleeve. 

In  drawing  his  background,  Tolstoy  seems  abso- 
lutely to  avoid  the  descriptions  of  magnificent  land- 
scape in  which  Pushkin  revels,  even  when  they  are 
almost  forced  upon  him  by  his  subject.    At  the  opening 


EARLY  WORKS  51 

of  the  story,  without  mentioning  a  single  detail  of  the 
mountain  scenery,  he  tells  of  the  overwhelming  impres- 
sion that  the  first  view  of  it  made  on  the  soul  of  his  hero: 

It  was  an  absolutely  clear  morning.  Suddenly  he  saw,  about 
twenty  paces  from  him,  as  it  seemed  to  him  at  the  first  moment, 
the  pure  white  masses  with  their  delicate  contours,  and  the 
fantastic,  distinct,  airy  line  of  their  summits  and  of  the  dis- 
tant sky.  And  when  he  came  to  understand  the  great  distance 
between  him  and  the  mountains  and  the  sky,  the  whole  im- 
mensity of  the  mountains;  and  when  he  began  to  feel  all  the 
infinity  of  this  beauty,  he  became  alarmed  lest  it  might  be  a 
phantom,  a  dream.  He  shook  himself,  in  order  to  wake  up. 
The  mountains  were  still  the  same. 

"What  is  that.?    What  is  it.?"  he  asked  of  the  driver. 

**The  mountains,"  the  Nogay  answered  with  indifference. . . . 

Owing  to  the  quick  movement  of  the  troika  along  the  even 
road,  the  mountains  seemed  to  be  running  along  the  horizon, 
their  rosy  peaks  glittering  in  the  rising  sun.  At  first  the 
mountains  only  surprised  Olenin,  then  they  made  him  joyful; 
but  later,  by  gazing  more  and  more  at  this  chain  of  snowy 
mountains  which  rose  and  fled  away,  not  from  other,  black 
mountains,  but  directly  from  the  plain,  he  gradually  began  to 
penetrate  into  this  beauty  and  to  feel  the  mountains.  From 
that  moment,  all  that  he  saw,  all  that  he  thought,  all  that  he 
felt,  assumed  for  him  the  novel,  sternly  majestic  character 
of  the  mountains. — [Ch.  3.1 

But,  like  other  high  emotion,  the  influence  of  the 
mountains  seems  to  have  been  transitory.  After  this 
chapter  they  and  their  grandeur  disappear  from  view. 
The  Terek  is  not  the  fierce,  angry  stream  of  Lermontov's 


6^  TOLSTOY 

ballad,  swollen  by  the  melting  snows  of  spring,  but  a 
watercourse  dwindling  beneath  the  summer  heat, 
which  horsemen  can  ford.  Olenin  goes  hunting  in  the 
woods  and  is  persecuted  by  the  mosquitoes.  Life  in  the 
Caucasus  is  like  life  elsewhere,  full  of  petty  discomforts, 
but  made  dignified  by  moral  striving.  And  Olenin  amid 
clouds  of  mosquitoes  becomes  absorbed  in  meditations 
on  moral  problems. 

The  greatest  artistic  merit  in  the  story  is  found  in 
the  picture  of  the  Cossack  community.  These  men  are 
drunken,  deceitful,  lustful,  cruel,  but  withal  natural, 
unconscious,  self-respecting  human  animals.  Uncle 
Eroshka  is  a  part  of  the  woods  through  which  he  guides 
Olenin.  Lukashka  is  free  as  a  wolf  from  thought,  and 
from  romantic  exaggeration  of  his  own  sldll,  when  he 
shoots  the  Circassian  who  is  stealthily  swimming  the 
stream.  With  such  a  community  the  self-conscious 
Olenin  cannot  blend.  Tolstoy  contrasts  him  with  it  so  that 
he  seems  neither  inferior  nor  superior,  but  just  different. 
Our  sympathies  go  out  both  to  him  and  to  Maryana. 

As  for  Maryana,  she  is  the  first  young  girl  whom 
Tolstoy  introduces  into  his  writings.  He  wisely  does 
not  attempt  to  analyze  her  thoughts  and  feelings,  but 
lets  us  infer  them  from  her  outward  life.  The  following 
passage  shows  her  at  her  best;  its  absolute  simplicity 
and  directness  place  it  at  the  height  of  Tolstoy's  art: 

Maryana,  after  eating  her  dinner,  gave  some  grass  to  the 
bulls,  rolled  up  her  half-coat  under  her  head,  and  lay  down 


EARLY  WORKS  53 

beneath  the  cart  on  the  succulent,  crushed  grass.  She  wore 
only  a  red  silk  kerchief  on  her  head,  and  a  faded  blue  chintz 
shirt,  but  she  felt  unbearably  hot.  Her  face  glowed,  her  legs 
moved  restlessly,  her  eyes  were  covered  with  the  moisture  of 
sleep  and  weariness;  her  lips  opened  involuntarily  and  her 
breast  heaved  high  and  heavily. 

The  working  season  had  begun  two  weeks  before,  and  hard, 
uninterrupted  work  filled  the  whole  life  of  the  young  girl. 
In  the  early  morning  twilight  she  jumped  up,  washed  her 
face  with  cold  water,  fastened  on  her  kerchief,  and  ran  bare- 
foot to  the  cattle.  She  hastily  put  on  her  shoes  and  her  half- 
coat,  and,  tying  some  bread  in  a  bundle,  harnessed  the  bulls, 
and  rode  off  to  the  vineyards  for  the  whole  day.  There  she 
rested  only  for  an  hour;  she  cut  the  grapes  and  carried  the 
baskets,  and  in  the  evening,  merry  and  not  tired,  leading 
the  bulls  by  a  cord  and  urging  them  on  with  a  long  switch,  she 
returned  to  the  village.  After  housing  the  cattle  in  the  twi- 
light, catching  up  some  sunflower  seeds  in  the  wide  sleeve  of 
her  shirt,  she  went  out  to  the  corner  to  have  a  laugh  with  the 
girls.  But  as  soon  as  the  light  faded  she  was  on  her  way  to  the 
house;  and,  after  eating  her  supper  in  the  dark  shed  with  her 
father,  mother,  and  little  brother,  she  went  into  the  house, 
carefree  and  healthy,  took  her  seat  on  the  oven,  and,  half- 
dozing,  listened  to  the  talk  of  the  lodger.  As  soon  as  he  left, 
she  threw  herself  on  her  bed  and  slept  till  morning  a  sound, 
cahn  sleep.    The  next  day  it  was  the  same. — [Ch.  29.] 


CHAPTER  III 

LIFE  AND  WORK,  1855-62 

[HE  years  immediately  following  the  Crimean 
war  were  a  time  of  political  discussion  in 
Russia  such  as  had  never  before  been  known. 
The  icy  oppression  of  Nicholas  I  had  passed 
away  and  new  forces  were  beginning  to  be  felt  in  the 
nation.  Defeat  in  war  had  shown  the  weakness  of  the 
country  and  the  need  of  internal  reforms.  The  greatest 
of  these  reforms  was  to  be  the  emancipation  of  the 
peasantry,  the  great  body  of  the  Russian  people,  who 
up  to  this  time  had  been  serfs,  the  property  of  the 
landed  nobility,  bought  and  sold  like  cattle.  Once  the 
yoke  of  serfdom  was  cast  aside,  it  was  felt  that  Russia 
would  breathe  new  life.  Four  schools  of  political  thought 
had  made  their  appearance,  which  may  fairly  be  termed 
political  parties,  though  we  must  not  attach  to  the 
term  any  such  definite  associations  as  in  England  and 
America. 

The  first  school,  the  Official  Nationalists,  were  the  up- 
holders of  the  existing  order.  In  their  eyes  Russia  was  a 
peculiar  nation:  its  autocracy  represented  a  state  order 
infinitely  superior  to  the  constitutional  governments  of 

54 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-62  55 

the  west,  with  their  continual  parhamentary  disputes; 
its  orthodoxy^  embodied  in  the  state  church,  preserved 
the  true  principle  of  primitive  Christian  love,  in  oppo- 
sition both  to  the  stiff  hierarchy  of  Catholicism,  which 
erected  the  church  into  a  rival  state,  and  to  the  jangling, 
rationalistic  sects  of  Protestantism;  and  its  nationality, 
the  simple,  patriarchal  organization  of  the  people,  was 
an  ideal  social  order.  To  the  Nationalists  were  opposed 
the  second  school,  the  Liberals,  whose  watchwords  were 
progress  and  freedom  of  thought,  and  whose  ideal 
of  state  organization  was  contemporary  England  or  the 
United  States,  with  their  respect  for  individual  liberty 
and  their  guarantees  of  freedom  of  speech,  of  the  press, 
of  conscience.  To  organized  religion  they  were  opposed, 
and  personally  most  of  them  were  sceptics  and  free 
thinkers.  Their  membership  was  mainly  recruited 
from  the  minor  nobility  of  Russia.  The  third  group, 
the  Socialists,  who  at  this  time  were  still  a  very  small 
party,  accepted  the  political  program  of  the  Liberals, 
but  found  it  inadequate;  to  political  freedom  they  would 
add  economic  equality.  Finally,  the  fourth  school,  the 
Sla>a>philes,  who  were  rather  a  philosophic  sect  than  a 
political  party,  agreed  with  the  Official  Nationalists  in 
regarding  the  Russians  as  an  elect  and  a  peculiar  people, 
and  accepted  the  Nationalist  trinity  of  autocracy, 
orthodoxy y  and  nationality,  though  their  interpretation  of 
these  principles  was  often  radically  opposed  to  that  of 
the  Nationalists;  they  joined  with  the  Liberals  in  their 
admiration  of  freedom  of  thought;  they  were  not  neces- 


56  TOLSTOY 

sarily  opposed  even  to  the  Socialists.  Their  distinguishing 
idea  was  that  Russia  could  progress  only  by  developing  its 
native  institutions,  not  by  imitating  western  Europe. 
Slavic  culture  must  evolve  independently  of  Germanic 
or  Latin  traditions;  Russia  should  take  the  lead  in  a 
new  epoch  of  human  history.  After  1870  they  came  to 
maintain  that  Russia  should  place  itself  at  the  head  of 
a  federation  of  Slavic  nations,  of  which  the  capital  was 
to  be  Constantinople.  In  opposition  to  the  Liberals, 
they  were  animated  by  religious  enthusiasm.  Against 
the  Nationalists,  the  other  three  parties  were  united 
in  support  of  the  emancipation  movement. 

Tolstoy,  an  individualist  to  the  marrow  of  his  bones, 
never  belonged  to  any  party;  but,  as  time  advanced,  he 
developed  a  stronger  dislike  for  the  Liberals,  with  some 
of  whose  leaders  he  had  formerly  been  temporarily  as- 
sociated, than  for  any  other  group.  Their  emphasis  on 
progress  and  on  public  activity  proved  alien  to  his  spirit. 
With  the  Nationalists  he  was  associated  by  family  tradi- 
tions and  by  sentimental  loyalty  to  the  tsar.  Some  of  his 
own  ideas,  as  that  of  the  inborn  excellence  of  the  Russian 
common  people,  coincided  with  those  of  the  Slavophiles. 
With  the  Socialists,  who  were  parvenus  and  sceptics 
even  more  than  the  Liberals,  he  had  no  connections. 
Yet  in  his  later  years,  after  his  religious  conversion,  he 
developed  points  of  contact  with  them  at  least  on  the  nega- 
tive side,  in  his  destructive  criticism  of  existing  society. 

When  Tolstoy  arrived  in  St.  Petersburg  in  November, 
1855,  he  naturally  became  associated  with  the  circle  of 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-63  67 

authors  writing  for  the  Contemporary y  in  which  his 
own  works  had  been  pubHshed.  '  This  journal,  founded 
in  1836  by  Pushkin,  had  since  1847  been  under  the  direc- 
tion of  Panayev  and  the  poet  Nekrasov,  who  had  made  it 
the  chief  Uterary  force  in  Russia,  and,  above  all,  the  main 
organ  of  Russian  liberal  thought.  Among  its  contributors 
were  Turgenev,  Goncharov,  and  Grigorovich,  the  lead- 
ing novelists  of  their  time,  and  the  dramatist  Ostrovsky. 
Literature  in  Russia  at  this  period  occupied  a  far 
different  position  from  that  which  it  now  holds  in 
America  or  England.  It  appealed  to  a  very  small  por- 
tion of  the  nation,  for  the  peasantry  was  almost  entirely 
illiterate,  and  the  trading  classes  were  impervious  to 
intellectual  influences.  On  the  other  hand,  such  a 
journal  as  the  Contemporary  had  much  more  powerful 
influence  upon  its  readers  than  any  one  American  or 
English  periodical  to  which  it  can  be  compared.  Direct 
discussion  of  public  questions  was  practically  impossible 
under  the  rigid  censorship  of  the  press  that  prevailed 
in  Russia.  Public  opinion  was  molded  by  social  dis- 
cussion, and,  in  an  indirect  fashion,  by  the  influence 
of  poetry,  fiction,  and  criticism.  Even  the  most  arbi- 
trary censor  could  hardly  prohibit  an  article  on  Eugene 
Onegin  simply  because  it  touched  on  the  social  import  of 
the  characters  drawn  by  Pushkin.  And  no  writer  of 
stories  could  describe  truthfully  any  phase  of  Russian 
life  without  at  least  seeming  to  pass  judgment  on  it, 
whether  favorable  or  unfavorable.  Once  his  story 
was  in  print  it  was  read  hardly  less  for  instruction  than 


58  TOLSTOY 

for  amusement;  the  "tendencies"  of  the  tale  were 
discussed,  and  they  affected  the  popular  verdict  quite 
as  much  as  did  its  esthetic  merits.  Oftentimes  ten- 
dencies were  discovered  of  which  the  authors  had  been 
profoundly  unconscious,  or  which  were  even  quite  con- 
trary to  their  own  fixed  opinions.  Thus  Gogol  (1809-52), 
the  great  founder  of  Russian  realism,  by  his  satiric 
portrayal  of  corrupt  Russian  officials  in  The  Inspector- 
Generaly  and  of  stupid  landed  gentry  in  Dead  Souls,  had 
made  himself  the  idol  of  the  Russian  Liberals.  Later, 
when  Gogol  made  a  direct  confession  of  his  faith,  he 
proved  to  be  a  defender  of  the  autocracy,  the  Orthodox 
Church,  and  even  serfdom  itself,  which  he  praised  as  a 
divinely  ordained  institution.  His  popularity  at  once 
vanished.  Yet  he  had  not  been  insincere  in  his  earlier 
writings;  his  critics  had  read  into  them  meanings  that 
the  author  had  never  intended. 

One  may  form  some  conception  of  the  situation  if  he 
imagines  all  free  discussion  of  the  problem  of  capital  and 
labor  checked  in  America,  and  the  public  dependent  for 
enlightenment  on  the  works  of  such  novelists  as  Mr.  Her- 
rick  and  Mr.  Churchill,  and  even  ready  to  interpret  Mark 
Twain  and  O.  Henry  from  a  sociological  point  of  view. 

Naturally  enough,  Russian  authors  were  apt  to  take 
themselves  very  seriously  and  to  pose  as  teachers  of 
profound  truths  in  politics  as  well  as  in  personal  morals 
and  in  art.  The  Contemporary  group  were  united  by 
common  liberal  principles,  though  not  by  a  definite 
political  platform;    in  particular  they  had  an  ardent 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-62  59 

interest  in  the  emancipation  movement,  in  the  spread  of 
education  in  Russia,  and  in  the  greater  participation 
of  the  Russian  people  in  the  government  of  their  country. 
Though  they  were  of  various  ranks  in  society,  from  the 
wealthy  aristocrat  Turgenev  to  the  plebeian  Chernyshev- 
sky,  they  were  united  in  opposition  to  the  conservatism 
of  the  landed  gentry  whose  prosperity  depended  on  the 
maintenance  of  serfdom. 

With  this  group  Tolstoy  could  never  be  in  perfect 
harmony.  He  was  of  higher  social  station  than  any  of 
them,  and  probably  looked  down  upon  them  as  middle- 
class  scribblers.  A  lady  who  was  intimate  with  the 
whole  Contemporary  circle  writes  of  him  at  this  time: 
"Count  Tolstoy  was  not  a  timid  person,  and  was  aware 
of  the  strength  of  his  own  talent;  and  for  that  reason, 
as  it  then  seemed  to  me,  he  assumed  an  affectedly  free 
and  easy  manner."*  To  say  nothing  of  an  inborn  spirit 
of  contradiction,  which  made  long  cooperation  with  any 
body  of  men  difficult  for  him,  Tolstoy,  unlike  his  asso- 
ciates, was  little  interested  in  politics.  His  problems 
were  of  the  individual  life;  vague  aspirations  for  the 
good  of  humanity,  which  might  accompany  a  corrupt 
and  dissolute  private  life,  he  regarded  with  contempt. 
His  account  of  this  period  of  his  life  in  his  Confession 
may  then  be  readily  understood: 

Our  mission  was  to  teach  men I  was  an  artist  and  a 

poet  [that  is,  a  creative  writer],  and  I  wrote  and  taught,  without 
knowing  what  I  taught. 

♦Biryukov:  1,278. 


60  TOLSTOY 

This  faith  in  the  significance  of  poetry  and  in  the  develop- 
ment of  life  was  a  religion,  and  I  was  one  of  the  priests  of  it. 
To  be  a  priest  of  it  was  very  pleasant  and  profitable.  And  I 
lived  for  rather  a  long  time  in  this  religion,  not  doubting  its 
truth.  But  in  the  second  and  in  particular  in  the  third  year  of 
such  a  life  I  began  to  doubt  the  infallibility  of  this  religion  and 
to  inquire  into  it.  My  first  occasion  for  doubt  was  that  I 
began  to  observe  that  the  priests  of  this  religion  were  not  all  in 
agreement  among  themselves.  Some  said,  "We  are  the  best 
and  most  useful  teachers;  we  teach  what  is  necessary  and  the 
others  teach  incorrectly."  But  others  said,  "No,  We  are  the 
genuine  men,  and  you  teach  incorrectly."  And  they  disputed, 
quarreled,  wrangled,  deceived  and  cheated  one  another. 
Besides  this  there  were  many  men  among  us  who  did  not 
even  care  who  was  right  and  who  was  wrong,  but  who  simply 
pursued  their  own  selfish  aims  with  the  aid  of  this  activity  of 
ours.    All  this  made  me  doubt  the  truth  of  our  religion. 

Besides  this,  when  I  came  to  doubt  the  truth  of  our  writers' 
religion,  I  began  more  attentively  to  observe  the  priests  of  it, 
and  I  became  convinced  that  almost  all  the  priests  of  this  faith, 
the  writers,  were  immoral  men,  and,  for  the  most  part,  a  poor 
sort  of  men,  insignificant  in  character,  and  much  inferior  to 
the  men  whom  I  had  met  in  my  previous  dissipated  life,  and  in 
my  military  career,  but  that  they  were  self-confident  and  self- 
satisfied  as  only  men  can  be  who  are  either  absolute  saints  or 
who  do  not  know  what  sanctity  is.  These  men  became  repug- 
nant to  me,  and  I  became  repugnant  to  myself,  and  I  came 
to  understand  that  this  religion  was  a  deception. — [Ch.  2.] 

Tolstoy,  ever  prone  to  suspect  insincerity  in  others, 
was  unjust  to  men  who  united  high  aspirations  with  im- 
perfect performance  in  a  way  that  was  really  not  wholly 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-62  61 

unlike  his  own.  But  quiet,  weak-willed  literary  men 
and  professors  were  never  attractive  to  his  passionate 
temperament.  After  1858  he  made  no  contributions  to 
the  Contemporary,  His  literary  work  during  1856,  when 
he  was  most  thoroughly  affiliated  with  this  circle,  had 
been  scanty;  it  consisted  only  of  Youth,  Two  Hussars, 
and  two  short  tales.  The  Snowstorm  and  A  Morning  of 
a  Landed  Proprietor.  His  growing  discontent  with 
his  associates  is  reflected  in  an  entry  in  his  diary  in  1857: 
"My  stumbling-block  is  the  vanity  of  liberalism."* 
He  never  again  became  affiliated  with  a  Uterary  group. 
Shortly  after  his  return  from  Sevastopol  occurred 
the  first  serious  love  affair  in  Tolstoy's  life.  As  a  child 
he  had  had  a  passion  for  one  Sonichka  Kaloshin,  which 
is  presumably  reflected  in  an  episode  in  Childhood. 
Later  came  his  passing  infatuation  with  a  Cossack  girl, 
to  say  nothing  of  boyish  dreams  of  two  young  women 
who  scarcely  knew  of  his  affection  for  them.f  Now,  on 
his  return  from  the  army,  where  he  had  been  entirely 
deprived  of  women's  society,  he  looked  forward  eagerly 
to  family  life,  of  which  he  was  passionately  fond.  His 
attention  was  attracted  to  the  pretty  daughter  of  a 
neighboring  landowner,  a  girl  apparently  much  younger 
than  himself,  who  readily  accepted  his  attentions.  Bir- 
yukov,  who  is  the  sole  source  of  information  as  to  this 
episode,  conceals  her  identity  under  the  initials  V.  A. 
Tolstoy's  feeling  for  her  can  never  have  been  strong  or 

*Biryuk6v:  1,328. 

t  Cf.  Diaries:    Youth,  m7-52,  pp.  106-11. 


62  TOLSTOY 

unselfish.  Soon  after  the  beginning  of  their  acquaintance 
V.  A.  went  to  Moscow  to  attend  the  festivities  connected 
with  the  coronation  of  Alexander  II,  September  7,  1856. 
She  frankly  enjoyed  the  gayety  and  was  not  displeased 
by  the  admiration  of  various  young  men.  Tolstoy 
thereupon  wrote  her  a  series  of  instructive  letters,  setting 
forth  the  duties  and  responsibilities  that  awaited  her  as 
his  wife.  Though  not  even  correspondence  of  this  sort 
could  quench  the  girl's  affection,  Tolstoy  found  that  he 
was  himself  growing  constantly  cooler  towards  her.  In 
February,  1857,  he  left  Russia  for  the  west,  and  from 
Paris  he  sent  to  his  former  sweetheart  a  letter  in  which 
he  spoke  of  their  intimacy  as  a  thing  of  the  past.  His 
conduct  towards  her  had  not  been  above  reproach;  in 
a  letter  to  his  aunt  he  wrote:  "As  for  V.,  I  never  loved 
her  truly,  but  I  let  myself  be  drawn  into  the  wicked 
pleasure  of  inspiring  love,  which  afforded  me  such  joy 
as  I  had  never  before  experienced."*  When  Tolstoy  in 
Anna  Karenin  (part  i,  ch.  16)  wrote  of  Vronsky's  con- 
duct towards  Kitty,  he  was  doubtless  thinking  of  his  own 
youthful  experience.  Marriage,  as  we  know  from  one 
of  his  later  aphorisms,t  he  regarded  as  an  engagement 
into  which  a  man  should  not  enter  lightly,  but  only 
when  led  to  it  by  an  irresistible  force. 

From  this  experience  Tolstoy  drew  the  suggestion  for 
his  charming  story  Family  Happiness  (published  in 
April,  1859),  which  represents  his  life  with  V.  A.  not  as  it 

*Biryuk6v:  I,  310. 

t  Thoughts  on  God:  Wiener's  translation;  xvi,  419. 


Jt 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-G2  63 

was  but  as  it  might  have  been.  Here  for  the  first  time 
he  gives  an  analytic  treatment  of  a  woman's  character. 
A  girl  of  seventeen  tells  of  her  courtship  by  a  man  of 
thirty-four  and  of  their  marriage;  she  relates  how  they 
drifted  apart  owing  to  her  passion  for  society  frivolity 
and  her  husband's  absorption  in  his  work  and  his  own 
thoughts,  and  how  they  later  came  to  understand 
each  other — and  lived  happily  ever  afterwards.  The 
tale  has  wonderful  freshness  and  poetic  charm.  The 
portrait  of  the  man  is  delightful,  with  his  clumsy  kind- 
liness, his  sincere  friendship  for  the  girl  whom  he  has 
watched  develop  from  childhood,  and  his  joy  when  he 
perceives  that  after  all  she  may  sometime  be  able  to 
love  him  otherwise  than  as  an  affectionate  old  friend. 
The  girl,  with  her  genuine  sweetness  and  faithfulness, 
combined  with  an  eagerness  for  admiration  that  arouses 
her  husband's  jealousy,  is  even  more  appeahng.  This 
is  a  true  love  story,  that  of  a  courtship  that  does  not 
cease  with  marriage. 

During  this  period  of  his  life  Tolstoy  was  restless,  not 
settling  permanently  in  one  place.  His  first  trip  abroad 
was  made  apparently  partly  for  mere  amusement,  partly 
as  an  escape  from  his  unfortunate  love  affair.  He 
reached  Paris  in  February,  1857,  and  spent  some  time 
with  Turgenev.  On  April  6  he  made  a  striking  entry 
in  his  diary: 

Got  up  about  seven  and  went  to  see  an  execution.  The 
stout,  wliite,  healthy  neck  and  breast;  kissed  the  Gospel  and 
then — death.    What  a  senseless  thing!    A  strong  impression. 


64  TOLSTOY 

which  did  not  pass  in  vain.    I  am  not  a  political  man.    Morals 

and  art  I  know,  love,  and  can The  guillotine  for  a 

long  time  would  not  let  me  sleep  and  made  me  keep  looking 
around  me.— [Biryukov:  I,  317.] 

Here  he  vividly  characterizes  his  own  talent  and  gives 
a  hint  of  his  nascent  repugnance  to  acts  of  violence 
committed  in  the  name  of  the  state.  In  his  Confession 
he  refers  to  this  incident  as  one  of  the  main  causes  that 
made  him  cease  to  share  the  Liberals'  worship  of  prog- 
ress. 

From  Paris  Tolstoy  proceeded  to  Switzerland,  where 
he  met  his  father's  cousin,  the  Countess  Alexandra 
Tolstoy,  maid  of  honor  at  the  Russian  court,  and 
passed  the  time  gaily  with  her  and  with  congenial 
Russian  associates.  With  the  Countess  he  formed  a 
friendship  which,  despite  their  sharp  differences  on 
matters  of  religion,  endured  until  her  death  in  1904. 
Their  correspondence  is  a  precious  source  for  the  knowl- 
edge of  Tolstoy's  personality.  In  a  short  memoir  the 
Countess  gives  her  impressions  of  the  young  author 
after  his  return  from  Sevastopol: 

He  was  unaffected,  extremely  modest,  and  so  full  of  fun 
that  his  presence  enlivened  everybody.  Of  himself  he  spoke 
very  rarely,  but  he  gazed  at  each  new  face  with  marked  at- 
tention and  later  he  most  amusingly  told  us  his  impressions, 
which  were  nearly  always  rather  extreme.  .  .  .  He  divined 
people  by  his  artistic  sense,  and  his  estimate  often  proved 
amazingly  accurate.  His  homely  face,  with  its  kind,  clever, 
expressive  eyes,  made  up  by  its  expression  for  its  lack  of 


LIFE  AND  WORK,  1855-62  65 

elegance;  one  may  say  that  it  was  better  than  beauty. . . . 
He  was  constantly  striving  to  begin  his  life  anew;  and,  throw- 
ing off  the  past  like  worn-out  clothing,  to  dress  himself  in  a 
clean  garment. — [Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A,  ToU 
stoyy  pp.  3,  4,  6.] 

From  an  artistic  point  of  view  this  journey  is  of  some 
importance.  Tolstoy  was  outraged  by  the  indifference 
of  the  wealthy  guests  at  the  Schweizerhof  hotel  in 
Lucerne  to  a  poor  musician  who  had  diverted  them  for  a 
half-hour  and  then  vainly  asked  pay  for  his  trouble. 
To  shame  the  crowd,  he  immediately  captured  the 
musician,  seated  him  at  table  with  himself,  and  ordered 
champagne.  (As  Kropotkin  intimates,*  this  stroke 
caused  more  pleasure  to  Tolstoy  than  to  the  musician.) 
This  incident  he  immediately  described  in  his  tale 
Lucerne.  Kropotkin  comments  on  the  honesty  with 
which  he  depicts  the  discomfort  of  the  musician  in  the 
aristocratic  surroundings  into  which  the  author  has 
dragged  him.  The  sketch  closes  with  bitter  reflections 
on  the  way  in  which  external  civilization  dulls  ele- 
mental human  feeling  and  fosters  hypocrisy. 

At  about  the  same  time  he  composed  Albert,  founded 
on  his  own  attempt,  nine  years  before,  in  1848,  to  be- 
friend a  drunken  German  musician,  whom  he  had 
taken  with  him  from  St.  Petersburg  to  his  home  at 
Yasnaya  Poly  ana.  But  the  story  is  by  no  means  strictly 
autobiographic,  and  is  more  conventional  in  form  than 
most  of  his  writings. 

*  Russian  Literature,  pp.  116, 117. 


f}/ 


66  TOLSTOY 

In  August,  1857,  Tolstoy  was  back  in  Russia.  The 
following  three  years,  until  July,  1860,  he  spent  mainly 
on  his  own  estate  at  Yasnaya  Polyana,  but  with  fre- 
quent visits  to  Moscow  and  elsewhere.  In  Moscow 
he  was  a  typical  man  of  society,  devoted  to  gymnastics 
and  distinguished  by  his  dandified  clothes.  Into  dress 
he  could  throw  himself  with  the  same  passion  as  into 
other  enthusiasms;  yet  on  one  occasion  (during  his 
second  trip  abroad)  he  appeared  at  an  evening  re- 
ception after  a  long  tramp,  without  a  change  of  clothes, 
and  with  wooden  sabots  on  his  feet. 

In  the  beginning  of  1858  Tolstoy  wrote  his  notable 
story  Three  Deaths,  in  which  one  may  see  clear  signs  of 
the  influence  of  Turgenev's  manner.  The  three  deaths 
are  of  a  society  dame,  fretful,  peevish,  and  self-righteous; 
of  a  peasant  post-driver,  calm  and  resigned;  and  of  a 
tree,  majestically  submissive  to  the  laws  of  nature. 
Here,  even  more  clearly  than  in  Childhood  and  Sevastopol, 
he  makes  one's  attitude  towards  death  the  prime  test  of 
character.  In  a  letter  to  his  cousin  the  Countess  Alex- 
andra, Tolstoy,  who  was  little  given  to  criticism  of  his 
own  works,  writes  an  analysis  of  this  tale  that  is  re- 
markable in  its  self -revelation: 

You  are  mistaken  in  regarding  it  [Three  Deaths]  from  a 
Christian  point  of  view.  My  thought  was:  three  beings 
died;  a  lady,  a  peasant,  and  a  tree.  The  lady  is  pitiable  and 
horrid,  because  she  has  lied  all  her  life  and  lies  in  the  presence 
of  death.  Christianity,  as  she  understands  it,  does  not  solve 
for  her  the  question  of  life  and  death.    Why  should  she  die. 


LIFE  AND  WORK,  1855-62  67 

when  she  wants  to  live?  In  the  promises  of  Christianity  as  to 
the  future  she  believes  with  her  imagination  and  her  intellect, 
yet  her  whole  being  revolts  and  she  has  no  other  consolation 
except  the  pseudo-Christian  one — and  the  place  for  any  other 
is  occupied.  She  is  horrid  and  pitiable.  The  peasant  dies 
calmly,  for  the  very  reason  that  he  is  not  a  Christian.  His  re- 
ligion is  different,  although  in  obedience  to  custom  he  has 
performed  the  Christian  ceremonies;  his  religion  is  nature, 
with  which  he  has  lived.  He  himself  has  felled  trees,  sown  rye 
and  reaped  it,  killed  sheep;  and  sheep  have  been  born  to  him 
and  children  have  been  born,  and  old  men  have  died ;  and  he 
firmly  knows  this  law,  from  which  he  has  never  turned  aside, 
like  the  lady,  but  has  looked  it  straight  and  frankly  in  the  eyes. 
"Une  brute,''  you  say,  but  what  is  there  bad  about  une  brute? 
Une  brute  is  happiness  and  beauty,  harmony  with  the  whole 
world,  and  not  such  discord  as  that  of  the  lady.  The  tree 
dies  calmly,  honorably,  and  beautifully.  Beautifully — be- 
cause it  does  not  lie,  does  not  parade  itself,  does  not  fear, 
does  not  regret.  That  is  my  thought,  with  which  you,  of 
course,  do  not  agree,  but  which  it  is  impossible  to  dispute — it 
exists  both  in  my  soul  and  in  yours.  That  this  thought  is 
expressed  miserably,  I  agree  with  you.  Otherwise  with  your 
fine  feeling  you  would  have  understood,  and  I  should  not  be 
writing  this  explanation,  wliich,  I  fear,  will  even  anger  you  and 
make  you  impatient  with  me.  Do  not  be  impatient,  grand- 
mother [Tolstoy's  pet  name  for  the  Countess].  I  possess,  and  in 
a  high  degree,  the  Christian  feeling;  but  I  have  this  too,  and 
it  is  very  precious  to  me.  This  is  the  feeling  of  truth  and  beauty, 
and  that  is  a  personal  feeling,  of  love  and  calm.  How  they 
are  united  I  do  not  know  and  I  cannot  explain;  but  the  cat 
and  the  dog  sit  in  the  same  lumber-room — that  is  positive. — 
[Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  pp.  101,  102.] 


68  TOLSTOY 

There  could  not  be  a  clearer  statement  of  the  two 
conflicting  sides  of  Tolstoy's  nature.  A  few  months 
before  he  had  been  fascinated  by  reading  at  the  same 
time  the  Iliad  and  the  Gospel.  He  regretted  that  there 
was  no  connection  between  them.  "How  could  Homer 
fail  to  know  that  God  is  love?"  he  wrote  in  his  diary. 
And  he  answers  his  own  query:  "Revelation — ^there  is 
no  better  explanation."* 

In  February,  1859,  Tolstoy  was  elected  a  member  of 
the  Society  of  Lovers  of  Russian  Literature,  in  Moscow, 
and,  according  to  custom,  was  required  to  deliver  an 
initiation  speech.  In  this  address  he  showed  his  dislike 
of  the  Liberal  creed  by  exalting  the  preeminence  in 
literature  of  its  purely  artistic  elements  over  all  tempo- 
rary and  accidental  tendencies.  The  president  of  the 
society,  the  noted  Slavophile  Homyakov,  in  a  flattering 
reply,  took  him  gently  to  task: 

A  writer,  a  servant  of  pure  art,  sometimes  becomes  a  re- 
buker  of  society  even  without  being  aware  of  it,  independently 
of  his  own  will  and  even  against  his  will.  I  will  venture,  count, 
to  take  you  yourself  as  an  example.  You  are  advancing 
steadfastly  and  with  no  deviation  along  a  definite  path  of  which 
you  are  conscious;  but  are  you  completely  free  from  that  ten- 
dency called  the  literature  of  rebuke?  In  the  picture  of 
the  dying  post-driver,  for  example,  who  lies  dying  on 
the  oven  amid  a  crowd  of  comrades  who  are  apparently 
indifferent  to  his  sufferings,  did  you  not  rebuke  a  certain 
social  disease,  a  certain  vice?  In  describing  that  death  did 
*Biryuk6v:  I,  329. 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-62  69 

you  not  suffer  from  the  callous  unfeelingness  of  kind  but 
unawakened  human  souls?  Yes,  you  have  been,  and  you 
will  involuntarily  continue  to  be  a  rebuker. — [Biryukov: 
I,  351.] 

To  this  convincing  argument  Tolstoy  would  have 
answered,  if  we  may  judge  by  his  later  reasoning  in 
War  and  Peace,  that  he  had  never  wished  to  deny  the 
influence  of  literature  on  the  moral  life  of  the  indi- 
vidual, but  that  between  such  influence  and  any  possible 
effect  on  the  organization  of  society  there  is  an  impassable 
guU. 

Tolstoy's  life  on  his  home  estate  was  wholesome  and 
full  of  pleasure.  With  him  there  lived  for  some  time 
his  sister  Marya  and  a  distant  relative,  his  "aunt" 
Tatyana  Ergolsky.  Of  his  companionship  with  the 
latter  he  writes  charmingly: 

I  remember  the  long  autumn  and  winter  evenings,  and  those 
evenings  have  remained  for  me  a  marvelous  recollection.  To 
those  evenings  I  am  obliged  for  my  best  thoughts,  for  the 
best  movements  of  my  soul.  You  sit  in  your  chair,  read,  and 
think,  and  occasionally  you  hear  her  talk  with  Natalya  Pe- 
trovna  or  with  the  chambermaid  Dunechka,  who  was  always 
kind  and  gentle;    you  exchange  a  word  with  her  and  again 

you  sit  and  read  and  think The  chief  charm  of  this 

life  was  in  the  absence  of  all  material  care;  in  good  relations 
with  all;  in  firm,  indubitably  good  relations  with  those 
nearest  you,  which  no  one  could  disturb;  and  in  the  absence 
of  haste,  the  unconsciousness  of  the  passage  of  time. — [Biryu- 
kov: I,  335.] 


70  TOLSTOY 

Spring  had  a  beneficent  effect  on  Tolstoy  as  on  other 
authors  before  him.  In  April,  1858,  he  wrote  to  the 
Countess  Alexandra  Tolstoy: 

Sometimes  you  make  a  mistake  and  think  that  a  future  of 
happiness  awaits  not  nature  alone,  but  yourself  as  well;  and 
then  you  feel  splendid.  I  am  now  in  such  a  condition,  and  with 
the  egoism  peculiar  to  me  I  hasten  to  write  to  you  of  matters 
interesting  only  to  myself. — I  know  very  well,  when  I  con- 
sider the  matter  sensibly,  that  I  am  an  old,  frozen,  rotten 
potato,  boiled  and  served  with  sauce,  but  the  spring  so  acts 
on  me  that  I  sometimes  catch  myself  in  a  burst  of  ardent 
dreams  that  I  am  a  vegetable  which  is  just  about  to  bud 
forth  along  with  others,  and  which  will  grow  simply,  calmly, 
and  joyously  in  God's  world. — [Correspondence  with  the  Countess 
A,  A,  Tolstoy,  pp.  98,  99.] 

In  the  next  letter  this  vegetable  delight  in  spring  is 
replaced  by  a  more  poetic  tone : 

At  this  moment  under  my  very  window  two  nightingales 
are  singing  away.  I  am  making  experiments  on  them;  and, 
just  imagine,  I  succeed  in  attracting  them  to  my  window 
by  sixths  on  the  piano.  I  discovered  this  accidentally.  Some 
days  ago,  according  to  my  custom,  I  was  drumming  out 
sonatas  by  Haydn,  in  which  there  are  sixths.  Suddenly  I 
heard  out  of  doors  and  in  auntie's  room  (she  has  a  canary) 
whistling,  twittering,  and  trills  to  the  accompaniment  of  my 
sixths.  I  stopped  and  they  stopped.  I  began  again,  and 
they  began  (two  nightingales  and  a  canary).  I  passed  three 
hours  at  this  occupation. — [Ibid.,  pp.  100,  101.] 

At  this  period,  in  December,  1858,  Tolstoy  had  an 
adventure  which  nearly  cost  hina  his  life,  and  which  he 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-62  71 

later  narrated,  with  some  changes,  in  one  of  his  stories 
for  children.  Gromeka,  one  of  his  friends,  had  arranged 
a  hunt  for  an  enormous  she-bear.  The  gentlemen 
hunters  were  stationed  at  advantageous  points*  while 
peasant  beaters  drove  on  the  game  towards  them. 
Tolstoy  stood  in  the  deep  snow,  having  neglected  to 
follow  instructions  and  trample  a  hard  place  all  about 
him.  The  bear  rushed  upon  him,  and  was  not  halted 
by  a  shot  which  he  fired  at  close  range,  and  which 
lodged  in  its  jaw.  Knocking  Tolstoy  down,  it  tried  to 
seize  his  head  in  its  jaws,  and  tore  the  flesh  above 
and  below  his  left  eye.  Only  the  timely  arrival  of  a 
peasant  bear-hunter  saved  Tolstoy  from  death. 

Two  shadows,  neither  of  them  very  deep,  run  across 
this  picture  of  a  decidedly  happy  life.  As  a  practical 
farm  manager  Tolstoy  was  far  from  being  an  un- 
qualified success.  In  May,  1859,  he  wrote  his  cousin 
that  he  was  on  the  point  of  bankruptcy.  But  in  his 
next  letter  he  tells  her  that  she  has  erred  in  taking  him 
too  literally:  "I  cannot  become  bankrupt,  because  I 
am  alone,  and  I  know  how  (I  say  it  with  pride)  to  earn 
my  own  bread."  On  the  other  hand,  Tolstoy's  Hterary 
work  since  his  return  from  Sevastopol  had  been  compara- 
tively small  in  amount,  and,  great  as  were  its  artistic 
merits,  it  had  not  increased  his  reputation  as  a  writer. 
His  one  literary  friend  in  the  vicinity  was  the  poet 
Fet,  who  owned  an  estate  not  far  from  Yasnaya  Polyana, 
and  with  whom  he  maintained  an  intimacy  that  con- 
tinued interrupted  until  after  his  own  religious  con- 


72  TOLSTOY 

version.  To  Fet  and  to  Tolstoy,  Druzhinin,  the  critic 
of  the  Contemporary  group,  addressed  letters  in  June, 
1860,  urging  them  to  greater  literary  activity.  Upon 
Tolstoy  he  urged  his  responsibility  to  the  Russian 
public,  which  looked  to  literature  for  instruction  as  well 
as  recreation.  He  reminded  him  of  the  serious  and 
high  aims  of  the  circle  of  authors  to  which  they  both 
belonged.  Such  arguments  were  not  in  the  least  likely 
to  affect  Tolstoy. 

A  main  cause  of  Tolstoy's  indifference  to  his  career 
as  a  writer  of  fiction  was  his  revived  interest  in  the 
problem  of  popular  education.  His  early  experiment  of 
organizing  a  school  for  peasant  children,  in  1849,  soon 
after  he  left  the  University  of  Kazan,  in  has  been  al- 
ready mentioned  (p.  11);  in  1859,  he  had  renewed  his  at- 
tempt with  far  more  ardor  and  persistence.  He  was  now 
eager  to  study  educational  conditions  in  the  west  in  order 
to  prepare  himself  for  his  own  work.  A  second  motive 
for  a  trip  abroad  was  the  desire  to  join  his  brother 
Nikolay,  who  was  suffering  from  consumption  and 
had  been  sent  to  Soden  for  treatment.  He  left  Russia, 
accompanied  by  his  sister  Mary  a,  in  July,  1860. 

On  this  second  journey  abroad,  which  lasted  until 
May,  1861,  Tolstoy  studied  works  on  education  and 
observed  diligently  the  practice  of  German  and  French 
schools.  Of  his  remarks  and  conclusions  something 
will  be  said  in  the  following  chapter.  He  visited  Berlin, 
Leipzig,  Dresden,  Rome,  Marseilles,  Paris,  London,  and 
Brussels,   meeting  some  of  the  most  famous  men  in 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-62  73 

Europe,  among  them  the  novelist  Auerbach,  of  whose 
works  he  was  a  devout  admirer;  the  sociaUst  Proudhon, 
who  left  on  him  the  impression  of  a  strong  man,  with 
the  courage  of  his  convictions;  and,  in  London,  the 
Russian  exile  Herzen.  Herzen's  daughter  has  told  how, 
as  a  little  girl,  she  nestled  down  in  a  chair  in  her  father's 
study,  awaiting  with  trembling  heart  the  arrival  of 
Count  Tolstoy,  whose  works  she  had  read  with  delight. 
To  her  surprise  he  proved  to  be  a  dandified  individual, 
dressed  in  the  latest  English  style,  who  talked  with  her 
father  about  cock-fighting  and  boxing  matches. 

The  health  of  Nikolay  Tolstoy  had  not  been  restored 
by  the  visit  to  Soden.  The  brothers  traveled  together 
from  there  to  Frankfort,  and  thence  to  Hyeres,  on  the 
south  coast  of  France.  There  Nikolay  Tolstoy  died  in 
his  brother's  arms,  on  September  20,  1860.  "Nothing 
in  my  life  has  ever  made  such  an  impression  on  me,"  Tol- 
stoy wrote  toFet.*  In  his  Confession  he  couples  this  event 
with  the  sight  of  the  execution  in  Paris  as  a  chief  reason 
for  his  loss  of  faith  in  the  religion  of  human  progress: 

Another  case  in  which  I  was  conscious  of  the  insufficiency  for 
life  of  the  superstition  of  progress  was  the  death  of  my  brother. 
An  intelligent,  good,  serious  man,  he  fell  ill  while  still  young, 
suffered  for  more  than  a  year,  and  died  in  tortures,  not  under- 
standing why  he  had  lived  and  still  less  understanding  why  he 
was  dying.  No  theories  could  afford  any  answer  to  these 
questions  either  to  me  or  to  him  during  the  time  of  his  slow 
and  painful  death. — [Ch.  3.1 

*  Biryukov:  I,  378. 


n  TOLSTOY 

During  his  absence  from  Russia  Tolstoy  found  time 
to  write  Polikushka,  a  powerful  story  of  peasant  life  on 
a  gentlewoman's  estate.  A  poor,  ignorant  manorial 
servant,  whom  his  mistress  in  a  futile  sort  of  fashion  is 
trying  to  cure  of  his  thieving  habits,  is  sent  to  fetch 
home  from  town  a  packet  of  sixteen  hundred  rubles.  He 
loses  them  on  the  way  and  hangs  himself  from  grief  and 
despair;  his  distracted  wife  drowns  her  baby  in  the 
trough  in  which  she  has  been  washing  him.  With  this 
main  plot  Tolstoy  blends  a  subordinate  motif,  of  the  dis- 
putes among  the  peasants  as  to  the  selection  of  recruits 
for  the  army.  The  usual  autobiographic  and  religious 
elements  are  entirely  lacking.  Events  speak  for  them- 
selves, and  produce  an  impression  of  hopeless,  deadening 
misery.  The  tale,  when  it  was  published  in  1863, 
aroused  the  enthusiasm  of  Turgenev,  who  wrote  to  Fet: 

I  have  read  Tolstoy's  PoliJmshJca  and  been  amazed  at  the 
strength  of  that  mighty  talent.  Only  he  has  wasted  a  terrible 
lot  of  material  and  was  wrong  in  drowning  the  baby  son.  That 
makes  it  too  terrible.  But  there  are  truly  marvelous  pages! 
It  makes  the  shivers  run  down  my  spinal  column,  which  has 
already  become  thick  and  coarse.    He  is  a  master,  a  master! 

This  generous  praise  by  Turgenev,  which  is  only  one 
of  many  similar  expressions  of  admiration  for  Tolstoy's 
genius  on  his  part,  is  the  more  remarkable  because  it 
followed  an  acute  quarrel  between  the  two  great  authors. 
In  the  circle  of  the  Contemporary  Turgenev  was  beyond 
question  the  man  of  finest  literary  talent.    Despite  the 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-62  75 

present  tendency  to  depreciate  him  in  favor  of  Dostoyev- 
sky,  he  will  probably  continue  to  rank  next  to  Tolstoy 
among  the  Russian  novehsts  of  the  past  century.  With 
him  Tolstoy  had  become  more  intimate  than  with  any 
other  man  of  the  group,  despite  their  fundamental 
differences  of  temperament.  Turgenev  was  a  kindly 
man,  of  delicately  artistic  nature,  but  of  little  force  of 
character,  and  no  moral  enthusiasm.  In  his  later 
life  he  said  that  he  had  come  to  appreciate  landscapes 
most  of  all  upon  the  painter's  canvas.*  The  following 
criticism  of  On  the  Eve,  in  a  letter  to  Fet  (1860),  illus- 
trates Tolstoy's  attitude  to  his  friend's  work: 

I  have  read  On  the  Eve.  This  is  my  opinion:  generally 
speaking,  to  write  stories  is  waste  labor,  most  of  all  for  people 
who  feel  sad  and  who  don't  really  know  what  they  desire 
from  life.  However,  On  the  Eve  is  much  better  than  A  Noble- 
man^ s  Nest,  and  it  contains  splendid  negative  types:  the 
artist  and  the  father.  The  others  are  not  only  not  types,  but 
their  very  conception,  their  position  is  not  typical,  or  they  are 
absolutely  insignificant.  However,  that  is  Turgenev's  perpetual 
mistake.  The  girl  is  wretchedly  done :  *'* Ah,  how  I  love  you!' 
— ^her  eyelashes  were  long."  In  general,  I  am  always  surprised 
in  Turgenev  by  his  inability,  despite  his  intellect  and  his  poetic 
sense,  to  refrain  from  the  commonplace  even  in  his  methods. 
This  commonplaceness  shows  most  in  his  negative  methods, 
which  remind  one  of  Gogol.  He  has  no  humanity  and  no 
sympathy  for  his  characters,  and  they  turn  out  monsters, 
whom  he  rails  at  and  does  not  pity.  This  somehow  clashes 
painfully  with  the  tone  and  flavor  of  liberalism  in  everything 
*  Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  p.  17. 


76  TOLSTOY 

else.  This  was  all  right  ...  in  Gogol;  and  one  must  add 
that  if  one  is  not  going  to  pity  even  his  most  insignificant 
characters  one  must  either  curse  them  so  as  to  make  the  air 
blue,  or  laugh  at  them  so  as  to  make  the  reader's  sides  shake, 
not  behave  as  Turgenev  does,  who  suffers  from  spleen  and 
dyspepsia.  Speaking  generally,  no  one  else  could  now  have 
written  such  a  story,  notwithstanding  the  fact  that  it  will  not 
have  success. — [Biryukov:  I,  pp.  352,  353.] 

At  another  time  Tolstoy  wrote:  "Deuce  take  him! 
I'm  sick  of  loving  him!"*  Their  companionship  had 
never  been  harmonious.  Tolstoy  was  irritated  by 
Turgenev's  self-possession  and  tranquillity,  and  was 
given  to  teasing  him.  One  of  our  first  glimpses  of  them 
together  is  in  a  violent  dispute  in  Nekrasov's  apart- 
ments. Turgenev  is  pacing  the  floor  while  Tolstoy 
lies  on  a  couch  in  a  huff  and  exclaims:  "I  won't  let 
him  spite  me!  He  insists  on  walking  up  and  down 
past  me  and  wagging  his  democratic  haunches."  f 
In  1857,  on  Tolstoy's  first  visit  to  Paris,  they  are  said  to 
have  been  on  the  brink  of  a  duel.  Now,  in  1861,  soon 
after  Tolstoy's  return  to  Russia,  when  they  were  both 
visiting  Fet,  a  far  more  serious  conflict  occurred  be- 
tween them.  Turgenev  was  telling  of  the  education  of 
his  daughter,  and  remarked  with  approval  that  her 
English  governess  insisted  on  her  mending  with  her 
own  hands  the  clothes  of  poor  people  instead  of  giving 
mere  money  alms.  Tolstoy  exclaimed  that  a  well- 
dressed  girl,  holding  dirty,  ill-smelling  rags  on  her 
*  Biryukov:  I,  340.  f  Ibid.,  p.  273. 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-62  77 

knees,  was  playing  an  insincere  and  theatrical  part.  A 
sharp  quarrel  followed,  and  Turgenev,  pale  with  rage, 
used  the  words:  "If  you  talk  like  that,  I'll  punch  your 
face."  Tolstoy,  with  his  inborn  spirit  of  contradiction, 
had  been  irritating,  but  the  blame  was  on  the  side  of 
Turgenev.  When  Tolstoy  challenged  him  to  a  duel, 
Turgenev,  on  reflection,  sent  a  rather  stiff  apology, 
with  which  Tolstoy  expressed  himself  as  satisfied. 
Some  months  later  Tolstoy,  in  one  of  his  bursts  of 
generous  kindliness,  wrote  to  Turgenev  expressing  his 
regret  for  the  whole  affair.  Of  the  incident  he  spoke 
to  his  cousin:  "I  may  assure  you  that  my  part  in  that 
stupid  episode  was  not  a  bad  one.  I  was  absolutely  in 
no  way  to  blame,  and,  notwithstanding  my  conscious 
innocence,  I  wrote  to  Turgenev  the  most  friendly 
and  conciliatory  letter;  but  he  answered  it  so  rudely 
that  I  was  forced  to  break  off  all  relations  with  him."* 
The  broken  friendship  was  restored  only  many  years 
later,  in  1878,  after  Tolstoy's  religious  conversion. 

Tolstoy's  time  during  the  year  following  his  return 
to  Russia  was  occupied  by  his  peasant  schools,  by  literary 
work  on  educational  questions,  and  by  his  duties  as 
arbiter  of  the  peace  ^between  the  newly-freed  serfs  and 
their  former  masters.  During  Tolstoy's  absence  from 
Russia,  on  March  3,  1861,  the  tsar  had  issued  the 
great  Emancipation  Proclamation,  which  gave  freedom  to 
the  whole  Russian  peasantry.  In  the  discussion  and 
agitation  that  had  preceded  this  greatest  reform  of 
*  Correspondence  toitk  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  p.  16. 


78  TOLSTOY 

modern  Russia  Tolstoy  had  taken  no  part.  Of  his 
attitude  towards  it  he  later  told  Biryukov: 

As  for  my  attitude  at  that  time  to  the  excited  condition  of 
all  society,  I  must  say  (and  this  is  both  a  good  and  a  bad  trait 
in  me,  but  one  that  has  always  been  peculiar  to  me)  that  I 
have  always  been  involuntarily  opposed  to  epidemic  influences 
from  the  outside,  and  that  if  I  was  then  excited  and  joyful, 
it  was  with  my  special,  personal,  internal  interests,  which 
drew  me  to  the  school  and  to  communion  with  the  common 
people.  I  still  recognize  in  myself  the  same  feeling  of  resist- 
ance to  general  enthusiasm  that  existed  then,  but  which 
showed  itself  in  feeble  forms. — [Biryuk6v:  I,  pp.  397,  398.] 

His  only  share  in  the  movement  seems  to  have  been 
signing,  in  September,  1858,  along  with  104  other  land- 
owners of  his  province,  a  resolution  favoring  the  freeing 
of  the  peasants  and  bestowing  on  them  a  portion  of 
the  land  which  they  tilled,  for  the  loss  of  which  the 
nobiHty  should  be  compensated.  In  1861  he  once  re- 
marked to  a  neighbor  at  a  banquet  that  the  country 
was  really  indebted  solely  to  the  emperor  for  the  emanci- 
pation. Here  he  showed  his  usual  dislike  of  the  Liberal 
party,  which  had  taken  the  leading  share  in  the  great 
reform.  Of  his  own  early  writings  only  A  Morning  of 
a  Landed  Proprietor  and  Polikushka  can  be  interpreted 
as  implying  condemnation  of  serfdom,  and  even  in  them 
the  condemnation  is  rather  of  personal  stupidity  on  the 
part  of  the  serf-owner  than  of  the  institution  itself. 

Towards  his  own  peasants  Tolstoy  acted  fairly,  but 
with  no  marked  generosity.    Three  or  four  years  before 


LIFE  AND  WORK,  1855-62  79 

the  emancipation  he  had  adopted  the  Hberal  plan  of 
placing  his  serfs  on  a  rent  basis,  instead  of  exacting  from 
them  the  old  manorial  labor.  At  the  emancipation 
he  gave  them  no  more  land  than  the  law  required. 
"The  one  good  thing  that  I  did,  or  bad  thing  that  I 
refrained  from  doing,"  he  wrote  to  Biryukov,  "was  that 
I  did  not  change  the  location  of  my  peasants,  as  I 
had  been  advised  to  do,  and  that  I  left  the  pasture  land 
at  their  disposal.  In  general  I  showed  no  unselfish 
feelings  in  my  course  of  action  at  that  time."* 

Tolstoy  means  by  this  that  he  did  not  act  in  any  such 
way  as  the  dictates  of  his  later  religious  views  would 
have  led  him  to  do.  Among  his  fellow  serf-owners  he 
seems  to  have  been  regarded  as  a  dangerous  radical. 
In  order  to  adjust  relations  between  the  emancipated 
peasants  and  their  former  lords,  the  government  created 
officials  known  as  "arbiters  of  the  peace,"  chosen  from 
among  the  members  of  the  country  gentry  who  had 
been  in  sympathy  with  the  reform.  In  May,  1861,  the 
governor  of  the  province  of  Tula  appointed  Tolstoy  as 
arbiter,  despite  an  energetic  protest  from  the  pro- 
vincial and  district  marshals  of  the  nobility,  who  ap- 
parently thought  him  a  man  not  likely  in  his  official 
duties  to  serve  the  interests  of  his  own  class.  This 
office  as  arbiter  was  the  only  position  under  the  gov- 
ernment that  Tolstoy  ever  held  after  his  retirement 
from  the  army.  His  career  in  it  was,  to  speak  frankly, 
a  failure,  owing  to  his  refusal  to  putter  with  the  petty 
♦Biryukov:  1,408. 


so  TOLSTOY 

details  of  his  work.  Men  and  women  Tolstoy  under- 
stood; government  documents  he  despised.  One  paper 
he  forwarded  to  his  superiors  with  the  following  signa- 
ture: "To  this  document,  at  the  request  of  such-and- 
such  men,  because  of  their  illiteracy,  such-and-such  a 
house  servant  has  set  his  hand."  The  obedient  servant 
had  written  with  Chinese  fidelity  from  the  Count's 
dictation,  without  inserting  the  necessary  proper  names, 
and  Tolstoy  had  sealed  and  dispatched  the  document 
without  even  glancing  at  it. 

In  his  practical  work  Tolstoy  strove  for  impartiality, 
but  he  leaned  always  toward  the  side  of  the  peasants. 
His  hasty  temper  made  him  far  from  conciliatory  to  the 
proprietors.  As  early  as  July,  1861,  he  wrote  in  his  diary: 
"The  arbitership  .  .  .  has  involved  me  in  quarrels 
with  all  the  land-owners  and  has  injured  my  health."* 
Thus  one  Madam  Artyukhov  made  complaint  to  him 
of  her  former  house-serf,  Mark  Grigoryev,  who  had 
left  her,  regarding  himself  as  a  man  "completely  free." 
Tolstoy  wrote  in  reply: 

Mark  will  immediately,  according  to  my  instructions,  de- 
part with  his  wife  wherever  he  pleases,  and  I  beg  you  most 
humbly:  (1)  to  compensate  him  for  the  three  months  and  a 
half  during  which  he  was  illegally  retained  in  your  service 
after  the  time  of  the  Emancipation  Proclamation  and  (2)  for  a 
beating  inflicted  on  his  wife,  still  more  illegally.  If  you  do  not 
like  my  decision,  you  have  the  right  of  appeal  to  the  district 
sessions  and  to,  the  provincial  board.  I  shall  make  no  further 
*Biryuk6v:  I,  414. 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-62  81 

explanations  on  this  subject.  With  great  respect,  I  have  the 
honor  to  be  your  humble  servant.  Count  L.  Tolstoy. — [Biryu- 
kov:  I,  410.] 

In  this  case  Tolstoy's  decision  was  ultimately  con- 
firmed, but  in  various  other  cases  he  was  not  so  for- 
tunate. On  May  12,  1862,  he  passed  over  his  duties 
to  a  subordinate,  on  the  ground  of  ill  health,  and  a  few 
weeks  later  was  formally  relieved  of  his  office.  In  a 
letter  written  somewhat  later  to  his  cousin  the  Countess 
Alexandra  Tolstoy,  he  gives  his  own  view  of  his  conduct 
as  an  official: 

Outcries  against  my  arbitersliip  have  reached  even  you, 
but  I  asked  twice  for  a  trial  and  twice  the  court  announced 
not  only  that  I  was  in  the  right,  but  that  there  was  no  ground 
for  a  trial;  but  not  only  before  their  court,  but  before  my  own 
conscience  do  I  know,  especially  as  to  the  last  period  of  my 
work,  that  I  softened,  softened  too  much  the  law  in  behalf  of 
the  nobility. — [Correspondence  with  tlie  Countess  A,  A,  Tolstoy, 
p.  164.] 

Worn  out  by  work  and  worry  over  the  arbitership 
and  his  peasant  school,  Tolstoy  departed  for  the  prov- 
ince of  Samara  to  take  the  kumys  cure.  On  June  1, 
while  traveling  on  the  steamer,  he  made  the  following 
entry  in  his  diary : 

I  seem  to  be  born  again  to  life  and  the  knowledge  of  it.  The 
thought  of  the  folly  of  progress  persecutes  me.  With  the 
clever  and  the  foolish,  with  old  men  and  children,  I  talk 
of  this  one  subject. — [Biryuk6v:  I,  457.] 


82  TOLSTOY 

Tolstoy's  search  for  rest  and  health  was  interrupted 
by  news  from  home  that  aroused  him  to  a  burst  of  fury. 
His  conduct  as  arbiter,  or  his  work  on  popular  education, 
in  which  he  was  aided  by  some  students  who  had 
cherished  revolutionary  sympathies,  had  aroused  the 
suspicions  of  the  government  authorities,  who  ordered 
a  search  of  his  premises.  His  feelings,  and  the  events  that 
occasioned  them,  can  best  be  understood  from  his  letters 
to  his  cousin  the  Countess  Alexandra  Tolstoy,  who  was 
living  in  St.  Petersburg  on  intimate  terms  with  the 
highest  oflScials  of  the  empire;  she,  he  hoped,  might 
aid  him  to  present  a  complaint  to  the  tsar.  The  first 
was  written  from  Moscow,  on  his  way  home,  early  in 
August: 

They  write  me  from  Yasnaya:  on  July  13  there  came  three 
troikas  of  gendarmes,  who  forbade  everybody  to  leave  the 
house,  probably  even  auntie,  and  started  to  search  the  prem- 
ises. What  they  were  looking  for  is  still  unknown.  One  of 
your  friends,  a  dirty  colonel,  read  all  my  letters  and  diaries, 
which  I  intended  to  confide  only  just  before  my  death  to  the 
friend  who  will  then  be  nearest  of  all  to  me;  he  read  two  sets 
of  letters  for  the  secrecy  of  which  I  would  have  given  every 
thing  in  the  world — and  departed,  announcing  that  he  had 
found  nothing  suspicious.  It  is  my  good  fortune  and  your 
friend's  also  that  I  was  not  there;  I  should  have  killed  him. 
Fine!  Glorious!  That  is  the  way  in  which  the  government  is 
making  friends  for  itself.  If  you  remember  me  on  my  political 
side,  you  know  that  always,  and  especially  since  the  time 
when  I  fell  in  love  with  my  school,  I  have  been  completely 
indifferent  to  the  government  and  still  more  indifferent  to  the 


^ 


LIFE  AND  WOUK,   1855-6^  8S 

Liberals  of  our  time,  whom  I  despise  with  my  whole  soul. 
Now  I  cannot  say  that.  I  feel  anger  and  repugnance,  almost 
hatred,  for  that  dear  government,  which  searches  my  prem- 
ises for  a  lithographic  or  printing  outfit  to  reproduce  pro- 
clamations of  Herzen  which  I  despise,  which  I  have  not  the 

patience  to  read  for  very  boredom 

Once  I  wrote  to  you  that  it  is  impossible  to  seek  a  quiet 
refuge  in  life,  but  that  one  must  toil,  work,  suffer.  That  is  all 
possible,  but  only  if  it  were  possible  to  flee  somewhere  from 
these  robbers  whose  cheeks  and  hands  are  washed  with  scented 
soap  and  who  smile  courteously.  Truly,  if  my  life  is  spared  for 
long  I  shall  retire  into  a  monastery,  not  to  pray  to  God — that 
to  my  thinking  is  useless — but  in  order  not  to  see  all  the 
filth  of  worldly  corruption,  puffed-up,  self-satisfied,  and  in 
epaulets  and  crinolines. — Foh! — How  can  you,  excellent  person 
that  you  are,  live  in  St.  Petersburg!  That  I  shall  never  under- 
stand; perhaps  you  have  cataracts  on  your  eyes,  so  that  you 
see  nothing. — [Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A,  Tolstoy, 
pp.  162,  163.] 

A  second  letter,  written  from  Yasnaya  Polyana  on 
August  20,  is  in  far  greater  detail.  An  extract  will  give 
an  idea  of  its  tone: 

I  write  this  letter  after  reflection,  trying  to  forget  nothing 
and  to  add  nothing,  in  order  that  you  may  show  it  to  divers 
robbers,  the  Potapopovs  and  the  Dolgorukys,  who  are  purposely 
sowing  hatred  against  the  government  and  lowering  the  em- 
peror in  the  eyes  of  his  subjects.  I  will  not  and  cannot  let 
this  matter  pass.  All  my  occupation,  in  which  I  found  happi- 
ness and  comfort,  is  ruined.  Auntie  is  so  ill  that  she  will  not  re- 
cover.   The  peasants  already  regard  me  not  as  an  honest  man. 


84  TOLSTOY 

a  reputation  that  I  have  earned  by  years,  but  as  a  criminal, 
a  man  guilty  of  arson  or  of  counterfeiting,  who  has  escaped 
punishment  only  through  knavery.  "Ah,  my  friend!  You're 
caught!  Quit  talking  to  us  of  honor  and  justice;  they  almost 
put  you  in  irons."  Of  the  land-owners  I  need  not  speak — just  a 
groan  of  delight.  Pray  write  me  quickly  .  .  .  how  to  write 
and  how  to  forward  a  letter  to  the  emperor.  There  is  no  other 
way  out  except  to  receive  a  satisfaction  as  public  as  the  injury 
done  me  ...  or  to  expatriate  myself,  on  which  I  am  firmly 
decided.  I  shall  not  join  Herzen;  Herzen  may  take  care  of 
himself  and  I  of  myself .  I  shall  not  dissemble;  I  shall  announce 
publicly  that  I  am  selling  my  estate  in  order  to  leave  Russia, 
where  it  is  impossible  to  know  a  moment  in  advance  that  I 
myself,  my  sister,  my  wife,  and  my  mother  will  not  be  put  in 
irons  and  flogged — and  I  shall  leave. — [Ibid.,  pp.  163,  164.] 

These  letters  show  Tolstoy's  sentimental  loyalty  to 
the  tsar,  which  was  not  mixed  with  any  admiration  for 
government  officials;  the  point  of  view  of  the  peasant 
and  of  the  aristocrat  of  long  descent!  With  it  he  joined 
a  passionate  readiness  to  revolt  when  the  heel  of  op- 
pression touched  him  personally;  at  the  close  of  the 
letter  he  says  that  he  has  loaded  pistols  ready  in  case  of  a 
repetition  of  the  insult.  Evidently  only  his  passionate 
individualism  kept  him  from  sympathy  with  the  revo- 
lutionary movement.  One  may  add  that  Tolstoy 
succeeded  in  personally  delivering  a  petition  for  satis- 
faction to  Alexander  II  during  one  of  his  visits  to  Moscow; 
"the  emperor  later,  it  seems,  sent  an  aide-de-camp  to 
Lev  Nikolayevich  with  an  apology."* 

*Biryuk6v:  I,  462. 


LIFE  AND  WORK,   1855-62  85 

Tolstoy  had  long  felt  the  loneliness  of  his  bachelor 
existence,  but  no  real  love  had  come  into  his  life.  In 
April,  1858,  he  had  written  to  his  cousin:  "When  I 
arrived  at  my  country  house  it  seemed  to  me  that  I  was  a 
widower,  that  recently  there  had  been  living  here  my 
whole  family,  whom  I  had  lost.  And  in  very  truth  the 
family  of  my  imagination  did  live  there.  And  what  a 
charming  family!  I  regret  especially  my  oldest  son! 
And  my  wife  was  splendid,  although  a  strange  woman."* 
Now,  almost  over  night,  on  his  return  from  the  kumys 
cure,  he  fell  passionately  in  love  with  Sofya  Behrs, 
a  girl  of  eighteen,  the  second  daughter  of  Dr.  Behrs, 
a  Russian  of  German  extraction,  who  had  married  Miss 
Islenev,  a  friend  of  Tolstoy's  childhood.  In  June, 
1856,  he  had  visited  this  family  and  noted  in  his  diary: 
"The  children  served  us.  What  dear,  jolly  little  girls !"  f 
In  the  summer  of  1862  he  went  very  frequently  to  their 
home,  and  was  regarded  as  a  suitor  for  the  oldest  daugh- 
ter, Liza.  To  Sofya  he  declared  himseK  in  a  fashion 
that  he  has  made  famous  in  Anna  Karenin.  While 
standing  with  her  by  a  card  table,  he  wrote  on  it  with 
chalk  the  letters:  lyfteafvomaysLyaTsci. 
This  the  girl  interpreted  correctly  as:  "In  your  family 
there  exists  a  false  view  of  me  and  your  sister  Liza; 
you  and  Tanya  should  correct  it."  He  then  wrote 
further:  Yyanohtvrmomoaatioh,  which 
signified :   "  Your  youth  and  need  of  happiness  too  vividly 

*  Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  p.  99. 
tBiryukov:  I,  294, 


86  TOLSTOY 

remind  me  of  my  old  age  and  the  impossibility  of  happi- 
ness."  After  this  the  two  fully  understood  each  other. 

Meanwhile  Tolstoy  according  to  his  wont  was  busily 
analyzing  his  own  feelings.  On  September  4  he  wrote 
in  his  diary:  "I  fear  myself:  what  if  this  too  is  only  the 
desire  of  love,  and  not  love  itself  .f*  I  try  to  look  only  at 
her  weak  sides  and  still  I  love  her."*  Finding  himself 
firm  in  his  affection,  he  made  a  formal  proposal  on 
September  29  and  was  accepted.  He  thereupon,  with 
characteristic  honesty,  which  he  later  reproduced  in 
his  hero  Levin,  handed  to  his  betrothed  the  diary  in 
which  he  had  recorded  all  the  sins  of  his  youth.  The 
girl,  though  bitterly  undeceived  in  her  fancies  as  to 
her  future  husband,  did  not  waver  in  her  affection  for 
him.  They  were  married  almost  immediately,  on 
October  5,  in  the  Court  Church  in  the  Moscow  Kremlin, 
and  after  the  ceremony  they  drove  to  Yasnaya  Polyana, 
where  they  were  welcomed  by  Tolstoy's  brother  Sergey 
and  by  his  "Aunt  Tatyana." 

A  new  period  of  Tolstoy's  life  had  begun. 
*  Biryukov:  I,  471. 


CHAPTER  IV 

TOLSTOY  AS  AN   EDUCATOR 

EFERENCE  has  already  been  made  to 
Tolstoy's  experiments  in  popular  education 
among  the  peasant  children  on  his  estate, 
and  to  his  study  of  educational  problems 
during  his  second  trip  abroad.  One  may  say  without 
exaggeration  that  interest  in  education  was  Tolstoy's 
most  fervent  intellectual  enthusiasm  up  to  the  time 
of  his  marriage,  meaning  more  to  him  even  than  his 
brilliant  success  as  a  writer  of  fiction.  Thus  on  August 
19,  1862,  he  wrote  to  the  Countess  Alexandra  Tol- 
stoy: 

You  know  what  the  school  has  meant  to  me  ever  since  I 
opened  it.  It  has  been  my  whole  life;  it  has  been  my  mc^ias- 
tery,  my  church,  in  which  I  sought  and  found  salvation  from 
all  the  anxieties,  doubts,  and  temptations  of  life.  I  tore  my- 
self away  from  it  for  the  sake  of  my  sick  brother;  and,  still 
more  weary,  and  seeking  work  and  love,  I  returned  home. — 
[Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy^  p.  164.] 

Tolstoy's  position  as  arbiter  of  the  peace  enabled 
him  to  have  influence  on  other  schools  besides  that 

87 


88  TOLSTOY 

which  he  had  himseK  started  at  Yasnaya  Polyana, 
and  he  engaged  a  dozen  students  to  help  him  in  his 
work.  "In  1862,  when  I  was  arbiter,"  he  writes,  "four- 
teen schools  were  opened  in  a  district  containing  10,000 
people.  Besides  this  there  were  about  ten  schools  in  the 
same  district  held  at  the  houses  of  the  church  ser- 
vants and  among  the  servants  on  various  estates."* 
In  this  same  year,  1862,  his  enthusiasm  led  him  to  es- 
tablish an  educational  journal,  Yasnaya  Polyana,  in 
which  he  printed  several  articles  on  educational  prob- 
lems. The  periodical  had  small  practical  success  and 
cost  him  much  money.  After  his  marriage  in  October, 
1862,  Tolstoy  became  absorbed  in  new  cares  and  duties, 
and  for  some  years  ceased  work  in  his  school;  he  also 
soon  discontinued  his  journal,  of  which  but  twelve 
numbers  appeared.  Yet  he  had  not  lost  his  interest 
in  educational  questions;  in  1868,  before  he  had  quite 
completed  his  great  novel  War  and  Peace,  he  made  a 
note  of  a  plan  for  an  elementary  text-book  in  reading. 
This  led  to  the  publication  in  1872  of  a  Primer,  which 
was  divided  into  four  books;  this  was  revised  and  re- 
issued in  1875  as  A  New  Primer,  followed  by  four 
graded  Readers  in  the  Russian  language  and  four  in  the 
Slavic  language  (that  used  in  Russia  for  the  church 
service  and  for  purposes  of  religious  instruction).  These 
little  books  have  had  a  wider  circulation,  at  least  in 
Russia,  than  any  other  of  Tolstoy's  writings;  Biryukov 
in  1908  estimated  the  sale  of  the  New  Primer  at  1,500,000 
*  On  Popular  Education  (1874). 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  8d 

copies.*  Meanwhile  their  author  had  early  in  1872 
opened  a  school  for  peasants  in  his  own  house,  and  in 
the  fall  of  that  year  he  was  eagerly  explaining  his  methods 
to  teachers  whom  he  had  invited  to  hear  him.  In  1874 
he  defended  his  views  at  a  meeting  of  the  Moscow 
Committee  of  Literacy.  His  theories  and  those  of  his 
opponents  were  given  a  practical  test,  but  with  no  de- 
cisive results.  In  support  of  them  he  published  an 
article  On  Popular  Education  (1874),  in  which  he  re- 
peated much  the  same  doctrine  as  in  his  periodical  of 
twelve  years  before.  Besides  all  this,  Tolstoy  had  in 
1873  been  interested  in  a  project  for  establishing  an 
advanced  school  for  peasants,  "a  university  in  bast 
shoes,"  to  use  his  own  term,  which  the  pupiils  should  be 
able  to  attend  without  altering  their  way  of  life.  Setting 
aside  his  repugnance  for  social  activity,  he  sought  aid 
from  the  provincial  council  (zemstvo),  but  that  body 
preferred  to  devote  the  funds  at  its  disposal  to  a  statue 
of  the  Empress  Catherine  II!  Finally,  in  1876  and  1877 
he  had  dreams  of  organizing  a  teachers'  seminary. 
After  his  religious  conversion  in  1878  Tolstoy's  views 
on  education  naturally  assumed  an  entirely  new  char- 
acter, becoming  a  mere  corollary  to  his  religious  views. 
During  the  whole  period  from  1862  to  1874  Tolstoy's 
writings  on  education  present  an  essentially  consistent 
body  of  doctrine,  and  they  may  be  treated  as  a  whole, 
without    regard    to    questions  of    chronology.      Aside 

*  Perhaps  this  figure  is  too  high;    in  1901  (in  the  Brockhaus-Efron 
Encyclopedia)  Vengerov  estimates  the  sale  as  "over  800,000." 


90  TOLSTOY 

from  the  Primer  and  the  ReaderSy  and  a  few  minor 
pieces  that  have  unfortunately  never  been  reprinted, 
they  consist  of  the  following  articles  published  in  the 
journal  Ydsnaya  Polydna:  On  Popular  Education 
(1862),  On  Methods  of  Teaching  Reading,  A  Project 
of  a  General  Plan  for  Organizing  Popular  Schools  (a 
critique  of  a  plan  proposed  by  the  government).  Educa- 
tion and  Culture,  Progress  and  the  Definition  of  Education, 
Who  Is  to  Teach  the  Art  of  Writing:  We  to  the  Peasant 
Children,  or  the  Peasant  Children  to  Us?  and  Ydsnaya 
Polydna  School  in  November  and  December  [1861] — and 
of  the  article  On  Popular  Education  published  in  1874. 
These  articles  are  Tolstoy's  first  writings  of  a  distinctly 
didactic  nature.  They  make  perfectly  plain  certain 
points  of  view  that  were  implicit  in  his  works  of  fiction, 
and  they  contain  in  a  rudimentary  form  many  of  the 
characteristic  doctrines  that  he  later  developed,  giving 
to  them,  however,  a  different  logical  basis  in  his  re- 
ligious system,  in  his  works  on  ethical,  social,  and 
esthetic  questions. 

First  of  all,  Tolstoy  condemns  the  whole  fabric  of 
modern  education  and  the  principles  on  which  it  rests, 
and  supports  his  condemnation  by  remarks  on  actual 
conditions  in  France  and  Germany,  as  he  had  himself 
observed  them.  The  great  sin  of  modern  education, 
according  to  Tolstoy,  is  that  it  is  founded  on  com- 
pulsion, being  forced  by  the  government  upon  an 
unwilling  people  who  do  not  desire  it,  but  who  do  desire 
something  quite  different. 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  91 

Popular  education  has  always  and  everywhere  presented, 
and  continues  to  present,  the  same  phenomenon,  which  for  me 
is  incomprehensible.  The  common  people  desire  education, 
and  each  single  individual  unconsciously  strives  for  education. 
The  more  educated  class  of  men — society,  the  government — 
strives  to  impart  its  knowledge  and  to  educate  the  less  educated 
class  of  the  people.  It  would  seem  that  such  a  concurrence 
of  needs  should  satisfy  both  the  educating  class  and  that  which 
is  being  educated.  But  the  reverse  is  the  case.  The  people 
constantly  resist  the  efforts  employed  for  their  education 
by  society  or  by  the  government,  as  representatives  of  the 
more  educated  class,  and  these  efforts  for  the  most  part  are 
without  result. . . 

Germany,  the  founder  of  the  school,  has  not  succeeded  by  a 
struggle  of  almost  two  hundred  years  in  overcoming  the  re- 
sistance of  the  people  to  the  school. . .  Notwithstanding  the 
strictness  of  a  law  that  has  existed  for  two  hundred  years, 
notwithstanding  the  preparation  of  teachers  of  the  newest 
fashion  in  seminaries,  notwithstanding  all  a  German's  feeling 
of  submission  to  the  law,  the  compulsion  of  the  school  still 
weighs  upon  the  people  with  its  full  force;  the  German  gov- 
ernments do  not  venture  to  abolish  the  law  of  compulsory 
education.  Germany  may  pride  itself  on  the  education  of  its 
people  by  statistical  tables;  but  the  people,  as  formerly, 
generally  derive  from  the  school  only  repulsion  for  the  school. . . 

Reality  has  shown  me  the  following:  a  father  sends  his 
daughter  or  son  to  school  against  his  own  wish,  cursing  the 
institution  that  deprives  him  of  the  labor  of  his  son,  and 
counting  the  days  till  the  time  when  his  son  shall  become 
schtdfrei — the  mere  word  shows  how  the  people  regard  the 
schools.  The  child  goes  to  school  with  the  conviction  that 
the  authority  of  his  father,  which  is  the  only  one  he  knows. 


92  TOLSTOY 

does  not  approve  the  authority  of  the  government,  to  which 
he  submits  in  entering  school. — [On  Popular  Education  (1862).] 

This  use  of  compulsion  in  education  would  be  justified 
if  the  educated,  upper  classes  who  prescribe  the  school 
program  really  knew  what  they  wished  to  teach;  that 
is,  if  there  were  a  universally  recognized  religious  sanc- 
tion for  education,  such  as  there  was  in  the  middle 
ages. 

A  hundred  [mistake  tor  four  hundred?]  years'ago,  neither  in 
Europe  nor  in  our  own  country  could  the  question  what  to 
teach  and  how  to  teach  have  arisen.  Education  was  insep- 
arably connected  with  religion.  To  learn  to  read  meant  to 
study  Holy  Scripture.  In  Mohammedan  countries  there  sur- 
vives until  today  in  full  force  this  connection  between  learning 
to  read  and  religion.  To  study  means  to  study  the  Koran  and 
therefore  the  Arabic  language.  But  as  soon  as  religion  ceased 
to  be  the  criterion  of  what  one  must  study,  and  the  school 
became  independent  of  it,  this  question  was  bound  to  arise. — 
[On  Popular  Education  (1874).] 

Compare  the  dogmatic  school  of  the  middle  ages,  in  which 
truths  were  undoubted,  and  our  school,  in  which  no  one  knows 
what  is  truth,  but  to  which,  nevertheless,  the  pupil  is  forcibly 
compelled  to  go,  and  the  parents  to  send  their  children.  .  . 
It  was  easy  for  the  medieval  school  to  know  what  to  teach, 
what  to  teach  first  and  what  to  teach  next,  and  how  to  teach, 
when  there  was  only  one  method  and  when  all  science  was 
concentrated  in  the  Bible  and  the  books  of  Augustine  and 
Aristotle. — [On  Popular  Education  (1862).] 

But  at  the  present  time,  Tolstoy  continues,  there  is  no 
consensus   of  opinion  as   to   what  should  be  taught; 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  93 

"the  theological  tendency  struggles  with  the  scholastic, 
the  scholastic  with  the  classical,  the  classical  with  the 
scientific  [real],  and  at  the  present  time  all  these 
tendencies  exist,  without  one's  subduing  the  other,  and 
no  one  knows  what  is  false  and  what  is  true."*  "The 
university  does  not  like  the  clerical  education,  and 
says  that  there  is  nothing  worse  than  the  seminaries; 
the  clerics  do  not  like  the  university  education  and 
say  that  there  is  nothing  worse  than  the  universities, 
that  they  are  only  schools  of  pride  and  atheism;  parents 
condemn  the  universities,  the  universities  condemn  the 
military  schools,  the  government  condemns  the  uni- 
versities, and  vice  versa."  f  The  most  highly  educated 
men  justify  education  as  a  means  of  'progress ,  by  which 
they  mean  a  change  for  the  better  in  the  condition 
of  humanity  as  time  passes  by.  But  this  progress  is  a 
pure  assumption,  incapable  of  proof: 

I,  like  all  men  free  from  the  superstition  of  progress,  see  only 
that  humanity  lives;  .  .  .  that  the  labors  of  the  past  often 
serve  as  a  foundation  for  new  labors  of  the  present,  and  often 
serve  as  a  barrier  for  them;  that  the  well-being  of  men  now 
increases  in  one  place,  in  one  class,  and  in  one  sense,  and  now 
diminishes;  that,  however  desirable  it  might  be  for  me  to  do 
so,  I  cannot  find  any  general  law  in  the  life  of  mankind;  and 
that  to  subordinate  history  to  the  idea  of  progress  is  as  easy 
as  to  subordinate  it  to  any  other  idea  or  to  any  historical  dream 
that  you  please.  I  will  say  more :  I  see  no  necessity  for  searching 
out  general  laws  in  history,  to  say  nothing  of  the  impossibility 

*  On  Popular  Education  (1862).  t  Education  and  Culture. 


94  TOLSTOY 

of  it.  A  general  eternal  law  is  written  in  the  soul  of  each  man. 
The  law  of  progress,  or  perfectibility,  is  written  in  the  soul  of 
each  man  and  is  transferred  to  history  only  in  consequence  of 
an  error.  While  it  remains  personal,  this  law  is  fruitful  and 
is  accessible  to  each  man;  transferred  to  history,  it  becomes 
idle,  empty  chatter,  leading  to  the  justification  of  all  sorts  of 
nonsense  and  fatalism.  Progress  in  general  in  all  humanity 
has  never  been  proved  a  fact,  and  it  does  not  exist  for  any  of 
the  oriental  nations;  and  therefore  to  say  that  progress  is  a 
law  of  humanity  is  just  as  lacking  in  foundation  as  to  say  that 
all  men  are  blond  with  the  exception  of  the  brunettes. .  . . 

We  can  admit  that  progress  leads  to  well-being  only  when 
the  whole  people  subject  to  the  action  of  progress  shall  rec- 
ognize that  action  as  good  and  useful,  while  now  in  nine 
tenths  of  the  population,  the  so-called  common,  laboring 
people,  we  constantly  see  the  opposite;  and,  in  the  second 
place,  when  it  shall  be  proved  that  progress  leads  to  the  per- 
fecting of  all  sides  of  human  life,  or  that  all  sides  of  its  in- 
fluence taken  together  produce  more  good  and  useful  conse- 
quences than  bad  and  injurious  ones.  The  common  people, 
that  is  the  mass  of  the  nation,  nine  tenths  of  all  men,  con- 
stantly show  a  hostile  attitude  to  progress,  and  constantly  not 
only  fail  to  recognize  its  benefits,  but  positively  and  consciously 
recognize  the  harm  that  it  does  them. — [Progress  and  the  Defi- 
nition 0/  Education.] 

Tolstoy  then  points  out  that  progress,  while  aiding 
some  sides  of  human  well-being,  such  as  the  improve- 
ment of  ways  of  communication  and  the  development 
of  the  art  of  printing,  has  injured  others,  such  as  the 
primitive  wealth  of  nature,  strong  physical  development, 
and  purity  of  morals.     An  unbiased  mind,  he  main- 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  95 

tains,  will  see  in  the  celebrated  third  chapter  of  Ma- 
caulay's  History  evidence  of  retrogression  rather  than 
of  progress.  "We  personally  regard  the  forward  move- 
ment of  civilization  as  one  of  the  greatest  evils  due 
to  violence  to  which  a  certain  part  of  humanity  is  sub- 
ject, and  we  do  not  regard  that  movement  as  inevitable."* 
Compulsion  in  education,  Tolstoy  proceeds  to  argue, 
can  then  in  no  way  be  justified,  since,  lacking  the  uni- 
versal sanction  of  religion,  teachers  do  not  know  what 
to  teach,  and  since  the  ideal  of  progress  for  which  they 
profess  to  labor  is  illusory.  In  practice,  the  results  of 
compulsory  education  are  inevitably  bad.  The  ex- 
perience of  France  coincides  with  that  of  Germany; 
the  people  gain  almost  nothing  from  the  obligatory 
state  schools  and  derive  their  real  education  from  the 
great,  free  school  of  life: 

A  year  ago  I  was  in  Marseilles  and  visited  all  the  educational 
institutions  for  workingmen  of  that  city.  The  proportion  of 
pupils  to  the  population  is  so  large  that,  with  few  exceptions, 
all  the  children  go  to  school  for  three,  four,  or  six  years.  The 
programs  of  the  schools  consist  in  the  committing  to  memory 
of  the  catechism,  sacred  and  general  history,  the  four  rules  of 
arithmetic,  French  orthography,  and  bookkeeping.  . .  .  Not 
one  boy  in  these  schools  was  able  to  solve,  that  is  to  state,  the 
most  simple  problem  of  addition  or  subtraction.  At  the  same 
time  they  performed  operations  with  abstract  numbers, 
multiplying  thousands  with  ease  and  speed.  To  questions  on 
the  history  of  France  they  replied  well  by  rote,  but  when  I 
asked  at  haphazard  I  got  the  answer  that  Henry  IV  was  killed 
*  Progress  and  the  Definition  of  Education. 


96  TOLSTOY 

by  Julius  Caesar.  It  was  the  same  in  geography  and  sacred 
history,  the  same  in  orthography  and  reading.  More  than  half 
the  girls  are  unable  to  read  anything  except  the  books  that 
they  have  studied.  Six  years  of  school  do  not  give  the  ability 
to  write  a  word  without  a  mistake.  ...  I  became  convinced 
that  the  educational  institutions  of  the  city  of  Marseilles  are 
extraordinarily  bad. 

If  some  one,  by  some  miracle,  had  seen  all  these  institutions 
without  seeing  the  people  on  the  streets,  in  the  workshops,  in 
the  caf^s,  in  their  private  life,  then  what  opinion  would  he 
have  formed  of  a  people  so  educated?  He  would  surely  have 
concluded  that  it  was  an  ignorant,  coarse,  hypocritical  people, 
full  of  prejudices  and  almost  savage.  But  one  needs  only  to 
get  on  familiar  terms  with  one  of  the  common  folk  and  chat 
with  him  to  convince  himself  that,  on  the  contrary,  the  French 
people  is  almost  such  as  it  regards  itself;  clever,  intelligent, 
social,  open-minded,  and  really  civilized.  Look  at  a  city  work- 
man about  thirty  years  old:  he  will  write  a  letter  with  no  such 
mistakes  as  are  made  in  school,  sometimes  with  none  at  all; 
he  has  some  conception  of  politics,  consequently  of  contempo- 
rary history  and  of  geography;  he  knows  some  history  from 
novels;  he  has  some  information  as  to  the  natural 
sciences.  He  very  often  knows  how  to  draw  and  applies 
mathematical  formulas  in  his  trade.  Where  did  he  acquire 
all  that? 

I  involuntarily  found  an  answer  to  this  in  Marseilles,  when 
after  visiting  the  schools  I  started  to  wander  along  the  streets 
and  to  frequent  the  wine-gardens,  cafes  chantants,  museums, 
workshops,  wharves,  and  bookshops.  The  same  boy  who  had 
given  me  the  answer  that  Henry  IV  was  killed  by  Julius 
Caesar  knew  very  well  the  history  of  The  Three  Musketeers 
and  Monte  Crista.    In  Marseilles  I  found  twenty-eight  cheap 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  97 

illustrated  papers,  costing  from  five  to  ten  centimes.  Among 
250,000  inhabitants  they  have  a  circulation  of  30,000,  so  that 
if  we  suppose  that  ten  persons  read  or  listen  to  one  number, 
they  all  read  them.  Besides  this  there  are  the  museum,  the 
public  libraries,  the  theaters.  Next  come  the  caf^s,  two  large 
cafes  chantants,  which  every  one  has  the  right  to  enter  so  long 
as  he  spends  fifty  centimes  in  them,  and  which  are  daily 
visited  by  as  many  as  25,000  persons,  not  counting  the  little 
caf  4s,  which  accommodate  as  many  more — in  each  of  these 
caf^s  little  comedies  and  dramatic  scenes  are  produced  and 
verses  are  declaimed.  Thus  at  the  lowest  reckoning  a  fifth  part 
of  the  population  receives  oral  instruction  every  day,  just  as 
the  Greeks  and  Romans  received  it  in  their  amphitheaters. 
Whether  that  education  be  good  or  bad  is  another  thing; 
but  there  it  is,  an  unconscious  education  many  times 
stronger  than  the  compulsory;  there  it  is,  an  unconscious 
school  that  has  undermined  the  compulsory  school  and 
made  its  content  almost  nil.  There  remains  only  the  des- 
potic form,  almost  without  content. — [On  Popular  Education 
(1862).] 

Obviously  the  true  course  for  an  educator,  Tolstoy 
concludes,  is  to  reject  the  element  of  compulsion  in 
education,  and  to  adopt  the  methods  of  the  free  school  of 
life,  giving  to  the  uneducated  people  the  sort  of  educa- 
tion that  they  themselves  desire.  This  is  even  more  true 
in  Russia  than  in  western  Europe,  since  in  Russia  schools 
have  still  to  be  created  and  no  false  traditions  hamper 
the  educator.  "If  we  become  convinced  that  popular 
education  in  Europe  is  advancing  along  a  false  path, 
then  by  doing  nothing  for  our  own  popular  education  we 


d8  TOLSTOY 

shall  do  more  than  if  we  suddenly  introduce  into  it  by- 
violence  all  that  seems  good  to  each  of  us.'** 

For  Tolstoy,  the  two  cardinal  questions  of  education 
are,  what  to  teach,  and  how  to  teach  it.  The  sole 
criterion  by  which  the  first  can  be  answered  is  freedom; 
the  sole  method  by  which  the  second  can  be  solved  is 
experience,  t 

Not  even  reading  must  be  forced  on  the  people  if  they 
do  not  wish  to  learn  it: 

If  the  question  be  put  thus:  "Is  primary  education  useful 
or  not  for  the  people?'* — then  no  one  can  give  a  negative 
answer.  But  if  some  one  asks:  *'Is  it  useful  to  teach  the 
people  to  read  when  it  does  not  know  how  to  read  and  has  no 
books  to  read?"  then  I  hope  that  every  impartial  man  will 
answer:  "I  do  not  know,  just  as  I  do  not  know  whether  it 
would  be  useful  to  teach  the  whole  people  to  play  the  fiddle  or 
to  make  shoes.'*  Looking  closer  at  the  results  of  the  ability  to 
read  in  the  form  in  which  it  is  imparted  to  the  people,  I  think 
that  the  majority  will  reply  unfavorably  to  reading,  taking  into 
consideration  the  prolonged  compulsion,  the  disproportionate 
development  of  memory,  the  false  idea  of  the  completeness  of 
science,  the  repugnance  for  further  education,  the  false  self- 
love,  and  the  opportunity  for  senseless  reading  that  are  ac- 
quired in  these  schools.  In  the  school  at  Ydsnaya  Polydna  all 
the  pupils  who  enter  from  the  reading  schools  continually  fall 
behind  the  pupils  who  enter  from  the  school  of  life,  and  not 
only  fall  behind  them,  but  fall  behind  them  the  more  the  longer 
they  have  been  taught  in  the  reading  school. — [On  Methods  of 
Teaching  Reading.] 

♦  On  Popular  Education  (1862).  f  On  Popular  Education  (1874), 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  9^ 

But  in  general,  accepting  the  criterion  of  freedom, 
the  program  of  popular  schools  in  Russ'a  is  settled,  as 
Tolstoy  tells  us  in  his  article  On  Popular  Education 
(1874),  by  the  demands  of  the  population;  the  masses 
desire  to  know  the  Russian  and  the  Slavic  languages,  and 
arithmetic,  and  nothing  more.  Tolstoy's  problem  was 
how  to  teach  these  three  subjects  in  the  most  effective 
manner.  In  practice,  however,  he  was  far  from  re- 
stricting himself  to  this  program,  but  introduced  any 
other  subjects — such  as  drawing,  natural  science,  and 
history — that  he  found  appealed  to  the  children,  though 
presumably  not  so  greatly  to  their  fathers  and  mothers. 
There  is  a  wide  difference  between  the  rather  narrow 
dictum  just  quoted  from  his  article  written  in  1874 
and  the  freer  tone  of  his  writings  in  his  own  periodical, 
twelve  years  earlier.  In  1862  he  was  guided  by  his  own 
experience  in  his  school,  in  1874  by  reasonings  based 
on  the  demands  of  the  adult  peasants. 

With  regard  to  methods  of  instruction  Tolstoy's 
experience  was  similar;  he  acquired  a  fervent  dislike 
for  western  models.  The  object  in  the  schools  he  visited 
was,  he  concluded,  to  choose  the  methods  that  would 
make  life  easiest  for  the  teacher.  Great  emphasis 
was  laid  on  external  order,  which  deadens  interest  and 
thereby  destroys  the  pupils'  ability  to  learn.  Nor  did 
theories  of  pedagogy  seem  to  Tolstoy  of  any  value. 
In  all  pedagogy  there  is  but  one  principle  of  real  im- 
portance, to  arouse  the  interest  of  the  pupil  and  es- 
tabhsh  natural,  human  relations  between  him  and  the 


100  TOLSTOY 

teacher.  This  principle  he  admits  is  found  in  the  man- 
uals of  pedagogy.  "The  difference  between  us  is 
only  this,  that  they  [the  pedagogues]  lose  this  concep- 
tion that  teaching  should  arouse  the  interest  of  the 
child,  in  a  number  of  other  conceptions  about  develop- 
ment, which  contradict  it;  .  .  .  while  I  regard  the 
arousing  of  interest  in  the  child,  the  greatest  possible 
ease  of  study,  and  therefore  its  naturalness  and  freedom 
from  compulsion,  as  the  fundamental  and  the  only 
test  of  good  and  bad  teaching."* 

Tolstoy  gives  a  specific  illustration  of  his  point  of 
view  in  his  discussion  of  methods  of  teaching  reading. 
The  old  church  method  was  to  make  children  memorize 
the  Slavic  names  of  the  letters,  az,  buki,  and  so  on,  and 
then  to  spell  out  words  by  means  of  them.  Passages  of 
the  Psalter,  unintelligible  to  the  pupils,  had  to  be  com- 
mitted to  memory.  The  new  sound  method,  imported 
from  Germany,  teaches  the  sound  of  each  letter,  not 
its  name,  and  begins  practice  in  reading  with  the  simplest 
sentences.  The  second  method  cannot  be  termed  an 
improvement  on  the  first.  The  energy  of  the  teacher  is 
dissipated  in  an  unsuccessful  attempt  to  make  the 
children  pronounce  the  consonants,  such  as  b  and  v, 
without  a  following  vowel;  and  the  meaningless  twaddle 
that  they  read  arouses  the  children's  contempt.  One 
boy  may  learn  to  read  from  his  brother  by  the  old- 
fashioned  method  in  a  few  weeks,  while  his  companion 
may  work  a  year  under  this  improved  German  method 

*  On  Popular  Education  (1874). 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  101 

without  results.  To  be  sure,  Tolstoy  himself  prefers 
still  another  method,  the  be-o,  bo  method,  to  all  others, 
but  he  frankly  admits  that  a  teacher  who  had  studied 
with  him  made  a  wretched  failure  when  he  tried  to  apply 
it  in  another  school  in  which  conditions  were  different. 
When  all  is  said,  the  only  true  method  consists  of  ex- 
perience and  experiment: 

The  best  method  for  a  given  teacher  is  that  which  is  best 
known  to  the  teacher.  All  other  methods  that  the  teacher  knows 
or  may  invent  should  aid  the  teaching  begun  by  one  method , 

Each  separate  individual,  in  order  to  learn  reading  in  the 
shortest  fashion,  should  be  taught  absolutely  separately  from 
every  other,  and  therefore  for  each  there  should  be  a  separate 
method.  .  . .  One  has  a  strong  memory,  and  it  is  easier  for  him 
to  memorize  syllables  than  to  understand  the  vowellessness  of 
a  consonant;  another  takes  things  in  calmly  and  will  under- 
stand that  most  rational  sound  method;  a  third  has  a  feeling, 
an  instinct,  and  he,  while  reading  whole  words,  will  understand 
the  law  of  the  composition  of  words. 

The  best  teacher  will  be  he  who  has  ready  at  hand  an  ex- 
planation of  what  has  puzzled  the  pupil.  These  explanations 
give  the  teacher  a  knowledge  of  the  greatest  number  of  methods, 
the  capacity  to  think  up  new  methods,  and,  above  all,  not 
the  following  of  one  method,  but  the  conviction  that  all  methods 
are  one-sided,  and  that  the  best  method  would  be  that  which 
should  answer  all  possible  difficulties  encountered  by  the  pupil, 
that  is,  not  a  method,  but  an  art  and  a  talent. — [On  Methods 
of  Teaching  Reading.] 

In  view  of  his  denial  of  historic  progress,  Tolstoy's 
definition  of  education  is  at  first  sight  somewhat  sur- 


102  TOLSTOY 

prising.  "Education,'*  he  tells  us,  "is  an  activity  of  man 
having  as  its  foundation  the  need  of  equality  and  the 
unchanging  law  of  the  forward  movement  of  education."* 
With  his  explanation  of  this  definition,  our  perplexity 
vanishes.  One  man  teaches  another  Latin  just  as  a 
mother  teaches  her  child  to  speak,  in  order  to  place 
his  pupil  on  a  level  with  himself,  so  that  they  may  under- 
stand each  other.  Man  feels  a  need  of  equality,  and  the 
one  who  knows  less  strives  to  approximate  his  knowl- 
edge to  that  of  his  more  learned  companions;  hence 
there  is  a  forward  movement  in  the  accumulation  of 
useful  knowledge.  When  equality  between  teacher  and 
pupil  is  attained  the  activity  of  education  ceases.  "The 
school  should  have  but  one  aim,  the  transfer  of  in- 
formation, of  knowledge,  not  attempting  to  pass  over 
into  the  moral  field  of  convictions,  belief,  and  char- 
.acter;  it  should  have  but  one  aim,  science,  and  not  the 
results  of  its  influence  on  human  personality."t  In 
other  words,  the  teacher  must  not  attempt  to  force 
upon  a  child  his  own  corrupt  character;  that  would 
be  an  act  of  violence  of  the  grossest  sort.  The  child 
has  less  information  than  the  teacher,  but  in  character 
he  is  superior  to  him: 

A  healthy  child  is  born  into  the  world,  fully  satisfying  those 
demands  of!  absolute  harmony  in  regard  to  truth,  beauty,  and 
good  that  we  bear  within  us;  it  is  near  to  inanimate  beings — to 
the  plant,  to  the  animal,  to  nature,  which  constantly  represents 
for  us  that  truth,  beauty,  and  good  which  we  seek  and  desire. 

*  Progress  and  the  Definition  of  Education .      |  Education  and  Culture, 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  103 

In  all  ages  and  with  all  men  the  child  has  been  regarded  as  a 
model  of  innocence,  of  sinlessness,  of  goodness,  truth,  and 
beauty.  "Man  is  born  perfect,'*  is  the  great  word  spoken  by 
Rousseau,  and  this  word,  like  a  rock,  will  remain  firm  and 
sure.  When  born,  man  represents  the  prototype  of  harmony, 
truth,  beauty,  and  goodness.  But  every  hour  in  life,  each 
moment  of  time,  increases  the  extent,  the  quantity,  and  the 
time  of  those  relations,  which,  at  the  time  of  his  birth,  were  in 
perfect  harmony,  and  each  step  and  each  hour  threatens  the 
destruction  of  that  harmony,  and  each  following  step  and 
each  following  hour  threatens  a  new  destruction,  and  gives  no 
hope  of  the  restoration  of  the  shattered  harmony. — [Who  is  to 
Teach  the  Art  of  Writing?] 

To  this  true  aim  of  education,  that  of  introducing 
equality  among  men,  Tolstoy  adds,  there  are  joined 
false  aims,  such  as  the  desire  on  the  part  of  the  powerful 
to  make  other  people  useful  to  them;  thus  the  govern- 
ment establishes  universities  in  order  to  train  capable 
public  servants.  This  university  education  detaches 
the  sons  of  honest  and  industrious  laborers  or  farmers 
from  the  environment  in  which  they  have  lived  and 
makes  them  despise  their  families  and  their  former 
associates: 

In  the  university  you  will  rarely  see  any  man  with  a  fresh 
and  healthy  face,  and  you  will  not  see  a  single  man  who  would 
look  with  respect,  or  even  calmly,  though  with  disrespect, 
at  the  environment  from  which  he  has  emerged,  and  in  which 
he  will  have  to  live;  he  looks  at  it  with  contempt,  disgust, 
and  supercilious  pity.  Thus  he  looks  at  the  men  of  his  own 
environment,  at  his  kindred,  thus  he  looks  even  at  the  activity 


104  TOLSTOY 

which  should  be  his  in  accordance  with  his  social  position. — 
[Education  and  Culture.] 

This  argument  is  at  first  sight  the  same  as  that  used 
by  some  English  aristocratic  opponents  of  attempts  to 
popularize  higher  education;  in  reality  it  is  quite 
the  reverse.  The  English  aristocrat  laments  any  ten- 
dency to  give  to  parvenus  the  education  that  has  been 
the  privilege  of  his  own  class;  he  will  preserve  intact 
his  superior  caste.  Tolstoy,  on  the  contrary,  finds  the 
university  product,  whether  aristocrats  or  parvenus, 
inferior  to  the  great  body  of  the  Russian  people.  The 
university  can  train  only — 

.  .  .  either  officials,  who  are  convenient  only  for  the  govern- 
ment, or  professor-officials,  or  literary-man-officials,  who  are 
convenient  for  society,  or  men  who  are  aimlessly  torn  away 
from  their  former  environment,  whose  youth  has  been  cor- 
rupted and  who  find  no  place  for  themselves  in  life — so- 
called  men  of  university  education,  cultivated,  that  is,  irritated, 
sickly  liberals.  The  university  is  our  first  and  foremost  educa- 
tional institution.  It  is  the  first  to  arrogate  to  itself  the  right 
of  education  and  the  first  to  prove,  by  the  results  that  it 
attains,  the  illegality  and  impossibility  of  education.  Only 
from  the  social  point  of  view  may  the  fruits  of  the  university 
be  justified.  The  university  prepares  not  such  men  as  are 
needed  by  humanity,  but  such  as  are  needed  by  a  corrupt 
society. — [Education  and  Culture.] 

With  his  contempt  for  "liberal"  innovations  and  for 
9,11  "liberal"  thought,  with  his  dislike  of  government 


► 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  105 

activity  and  his  desire  for  natural,  human  relations  in 
education,  it  is  no  wonder  that  Tolstoy  pours  forth  the 
vials  of  his  wrath  upon  the  project  of  a  new  plan  for 
organizing  popular  schools  brought  forward  by  the 
government  in  1862,*  and  founded  in  large  measure  on 
the  example  of  the  United  States.  Under  the  old 
despotism  of  Nicholas  I  the  government  had  itself 
done  next  to  nothing  for  popular  education,  and  had 
prohibited  the  opening  of  any  private  schools  whatever. 
That  law  was  so  bad  that  it  was  not  enforced;  it  was 
in  fact  forgotten,  and  private  persons  taught  the  peasants 
in  whatever  way  they  pleased,  or  in  some  cases  the 
peasants  themselves  opened  little  schools  of  their  own. 
The  new  project  attacked  a  huge  problem,  which  the 
authorities  did  not  in  the  least  understand,  with  grossly 
inadequate  means;  and,  though  it  legalized  the  opening 
of  private  schools,  it  laid  very  considerable  restrictions 
upon  them.  The  defects  and  inadequacy  of  the  new 
project  Tolstoy  shows  with  convincing  clearness.  The 
example  of  the  United  States  is  no  just  precedent  for 
Russia;  to  begin  with,  taxes  in  one  country  are  voted 
by  the  people,  in  the  other  they  are  imposed  from  above 
by  the  government.  The  danger  is  that  this  new  law, 
with  its  dull,  mechanical  prescriptions,  will  not  only  fail 
to  produce  any  good,  but  will  be  enforced  and  so  will 
crush  independent  effort  on  the  part  of  the  popu- 
lation. * 

*  Or  perhaps  in  the  year  previous;  Tolstoy's  article  was  published 
in  Ydsnaya  Polydna  for  March,  1862. 


106  TOLSTOY 

Tolstoy's  own  plan,  which  he  set  forth  a  doizen  years 
later  in  his  article  On  Popular  Education,  (1874),  would 
be  to  have  the  district  authorities  use  their  money 
primarily  for  the  encouragement  of  private  effort.  They 
should  spend  money  on  the  teacher,  not  on  the  location; 
a  real  school  consists  of  teacher  and  pupil,  not  of  a 
stone  building  with  an  iron  roof.  They  should  not  dis- 
dain even  cheap  teachers,  who  will  work  for  from  two 
to  five  rubles  a  month  in  smoky  huts,  or  in  transient 
lodgings  with  the  peasants.  But  the  authorities  should 
themselves  maintain  a  public  school  which  should  serve 
as  an  example  of  right  methods,  and  which  would  thus 
raise  the  standard  of  private  instruction.  In  other 
words,  Tolstoy  would  introduce  a  free  organization  of 
educational  institutions  not  entirely  different  from  that 
which  prevails,  in  differing  fashions,  in  England  and 
America.  His  recommendations  show  an  intimate 
knowledge  of  conditions  and  much  practical  common 
sense.  Despite  all  his  Utopian  idealism  and  despite  his 
cantankerous  refusal  to  cooperate  in  the  work  of  other 
men,  Tolstoy  had,  as  he  proved  at  intervals  in  the 
management  of  his  own  estates,  and  later  by  his  con- 
duct of  famine  relief,  a  considerable  share  of  practical 
executive  ability. 

Such  are  Tolstoy's  general  principles,  which  he  strove 
to  realize  in  practice  in  his  own  school  at  Yasnaya 
Polyana.  Of  his  delight  in  his  own  creation  he  speaks 
in  a  letter  to  his  cousin,  the  Countess  Alexandra  Tolstoy, 
written  in  July,  1861: 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  107 

I  have  a  poetic,  charming  occupation,  from  which  I  cannot 
tear  myself  away,  my  school.  When  I  break  loose  from  the 
office  and  from  the  peasants,  who  pursue  me  from  every  part 
of  the  house,  I  go  to  the  school,  but  since  it  is  being  repaired, 
the  classes  are  held  nearby  in  the  orchard,  under  the  apple- 
trees,  where  you  can  walk  only  by  bending  down,  it  is  so 
overgrown.  And  there  sits  the  teacher,  with  the  pupils  around 
him,  chewing  grass  and  popping  linden  and  maple  leaves.  The 
teacher  teaches  in  the  way  that  I  advise  him,  but  nevertheless 
rather  poorly,  as  even  the  children  feel.  They  like  me  better. 
And  we  begin  a  chat  which  lasts  for  three  or  four  hours,  and  no- 
body is  bored.  I  cannot  tell  you  what  sort  of  children  they  are; 
one  must  see  them.  Among  the  children  of  our  own  lovely 
class  in  society  I  have  seen  nothing  like  them.  Just  consider 
the  fact  that  in  the  course  of  two  years,  with  a  complete  absence 
of  discipline,  not  one  boy  or  girl  has  been  punished.  Never 
any  laziness,  any  rudeness,  any  stupid  jokes  or  indecent 
words.  The  schoolhouse  is  now  almost  finished.  Three  large 
rooms,  one  pink,  and  two  blue,  are  occupied  by  the  school. 
Besides  that,  the  museum  is  in  the  main  room.  On  the  shelves 
and  around  the  walls  are  arranged  stones,  butterflies,  skele- 
tons, herbs,  flowers,  physical  apparatus  and  so  forth.  On 
Sundays  the  museum  is  opened  to  all,  and  a  German  from 
Jena,  who  has  turned  out  a  splendid  young  man,  performs 
experiments.  Once  a  week  there  is  a  botany  class,  and  we 
all  go  to  the  woods  for  flowers,  herbs,  and  mushrooms.  There 
are  four  singing  classes  a  week.  Of  drawing  there  are  six  (the 
German  again)  and  they  go  finely.  Surveying  succeeds  so 
well  that  the  peasants  are  already  asking  the  boys  to  help 
them.  There  are  three  teachers  in  all  besides  myself.  And  then 
the  priest  comes  twice  a  week.  Yet  you  continue  to  think  that 
I  am  an  infidel.    And  then  I  teach  the  priest  how  to  teach 


108  TOLSTOY 

them.  This  is  how  we  teach:  on  St.  Peter's  day  we  tell  the 
story  of  Peter  and  Paul  and  the  whole  service.  Later  on,  when 
Feofan  has  died  in  the  village,  we  explain  what  extreme  unction 
is  and  so  on.  And  thus,  without  apparent  connection,  we  go 
through  all  the  sacraments,  the  liturgy,  and  all  the  holidays  of 
the  New  Testament  and  the  Old.  The  classes  are  arranged  from 
eight  to  twelve  and  from  three  to  six,  but  they  always  con- 
tinue till  two,  because  it  is  impossible  to  drive  the  children 
out  of  school — they  want  more.  In  the  evening  often  more 
than  half  of  them  stay  to  spend  the  night  in  the  orchard,  in  a 
hut.  At  dinner  and  supper  and  after  supper  we,  the  teachers, 
consult  together.  On  Saturdays  we  read  our  notes  to  one 
another  and  prepare  for  the  coming  week. — [Correspondence 
with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  pp.  154,  155.] 

Of  the  general  organization  of  his  school,  and  of  his 
experiments  in  the  teaching  of  different  subjects,  Tolstoy 
writes  at  some  length  in  his  article  on  Ydsnaya  Polydna 
School  in  November  and  December  [1861].  His  aim 
was  that  the  children  should  themselves  desire  to  ac- 
quire knowledge,  through  seeing  the  value  of  it,  and  that 
the  teacher  should  merely  assist  them  in  their  quest. 
This  concept  of  freedom  is  that  of  the  highest  univer- 
sity work,  which  Tolstoy  applied  to  the  primary  school. 
There  was  no  hint  of  compulsion  in  any  way: 

No  one  brings  anything  with  him,  either  books  or  copy- 
books. No  lessons  are  given  to  be  studied  at  home.  Not 
to  speak  of  bringing  anything  in  his  hands,  the  pupil  has  nothing 
to  bring  even  in  his  head.  He  is  not  obliged  to  remember  today 
any  lesson,  anything  at  all  that  he  did  yesterday.    He  is  not 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  109 

tortured  by  thoughts  of  the  coming  lesson.  He  brings  only 
himself,  his  receptive  nature,  and  the  confidence  that  at  school 
today  it  will  be  as  jolly  as  it  was  yesterday.  He  does  not 
think  of  class  until  the  class  has  begun.  No  one  is  ever  scolded 
for  tardiness  and  no  one  is  ever  tardy — except  perhaps  the 
older  boys,  whose  fathers  now  and  then  keep  them  at  home  for 
some  work.  And  then  that  big  boy,  out  of  breath,  comes 
running  to  school.  .   .   . 

The  teacher  comes  into  the  room,  and  on  the  floor  the 
screaming  children  are  lying,  shouting,  *'The  heap  is  small!'* 
or,  "The  boys  are  squashing  me!"  or,  "Quit,  stop  pulling  my 
hair!"  and  so  on.  *' Peter Mikhdylovich!"  cries  a  voice  from  the 
bottom  of  the  heap  to  the  teacher  as  he  comes  in,  "tell  them 
to  stop  it."  "Good  morning,  Peter  Mikhdylovich!"  shout  the 
others,  continuing  their  scuffle.  The  teacher  takes  the  books 
and  distributes  them  to  those  who  have  gone  to  the  book- 
case with  him;  those  who  are  lying  on  the  top  of  the  heap  on 
the  floor  also  demand  books.  The  heap  becomes  gradually 
smaller.  As  soon  as  the  majority  have  taken  books,  all  the 
rest  run  to  the  case  and  shout,  "Me  too,  me  too!  Give  me 
yesterday's  book — and  me  the  Koltsovish**  and  so  on.  If 
there  still  remain  two  or  three  excited  by  the  struggle,  who 
continue  to  tumble  about  on  the  floor,  then  those  sitting 
with  books  shout  to  them:  "What  are  you  fooling  there 
for?  We  can't  hear  anything.  Quit!"  The  excited  boys  sub- 
mit and,  out  of  breath,  take  their  books;  and  only  for  a  short 
time,  while  sitting  at  their  books,  swing  their  legs  from  un- 
allayed  excitement.-  The  spirit  of  war  flies  away,  and  the 
spirit  of  reading  reigns  in  the  room.  With  the  same  enthusiasm 
with  which  he  was  pulling  Mitka's  hair  he  now  reads  the 
Koltsovisk  book  (the  name  by  which  Kolts6v's  works  pass  in 
our  school),  with  teeth  almost  clenched  and  with  gUttering 


110  TOLSTOY 

eyes,  seeing  nothing  around  him  except  his  book.  To  tear 
him  away  from  reading  would  be  as  hard  now  as  it  would 
have  been  to  stop  his  fighting  a  short  time  before.  .  .  . 

According  to  the  program  there  are  four  lessons  before 
dinner,  but  sometimes  there  are  only  three  or  two,  and  some- 
times on  quite  different  subjects  ^from  those  set  down.  The 
teacher  begins  on  arithmetic  and  passes  to  geometry;  he 
begins  with  sacred  history  and  ends  with  grammar.  Sometimes 
teacher  and  pupils  grow  so  enthusiastic  that  instead  of  one 
hour  the  class  lasts  for  three.  Often  the  pupils  shout  of  their 
own  accord,  **No,  more,  more!"  and  cry  out  against  those 
who  are  bored.  "If  you're  sick  of  it,  go  off  with  the  little 
kids,'*  they  say  contemptuously.  .   .   . 

The  school  has  evolved  freely  from  principles  introduced  into 
it  by  the  teacher  and  the  pupils.  In  spite  of  all  the  preponder- 
ating influence  of  the  teacher,  the  pupil  has  always  had  the 
right  not  to  go  to  school,  and  even,  if  he  goes  to  school,  not  to 
listen  to  the  teacher.  The  teacher  has  had  the  right  not  to 
admit  a  pupil,  and  has  had  the  possibility  of  acting  with  all 
the  strength  of  his  influence  on  the  majority  of  the  pupils, 
on  the  society  that  always  arises  among  schoolboys. — [Ydsnaya 
Polydna  School:  General  Sketch.] 

Gradually,  by  the  free  action  of  the  boys  themselves, 
this  external  disorder  subsides,  and  a  free  order  is  es- 
tablished far  finer  than  any  that  could  have  been  de- 
vised by  the  teacher.  Despite  a  somewhat  wavering 
practice,  Tolstoy  is  convinced  that  even  to  stop  fighting 
among  the  pupils  is  a  mistake: 

How  many  times  have  I  seen,  when  children  were  fighting 
and  the  teacher  rushed  to  separate  them,  how  the  parted 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  111 

enemies  would  eye  each  other  askance,  and,  even  in  the  pres- 
ence of  a  stern  teacher,  would  not  restrain  themselves  from 
subsequently  kicking  each  other  harder  than  ever!  How 
many  times  do  I  see  every  day  how  some  Kiryushka,  with 
clenched  teeth,  flies  upon  Taraska,  pulls  his  hair,  throws  him 
on  the  ground,  and  at  the  risk  of  his  life  seems  eager  to  maim 
his  enemy — and  before  a  minute  has  passed  Taraska  is  already 
laughing  from  under  Kiryushka,  so  much  easier  is  it  for  them 
to  settle  scores  alone;  and  before  five  minutes  are  over  they 
are  becoming  friends  again  and  going  to  take  their  seats  side 
by  side.  ...  I  am  convinced  that  the  school  ought  not 
to  meddle  in  that  part  of  education  which  belongs  only  to  the 
family,  that  the  school  ought  not  and  has  no  right  to  reward 
and  punish,  that  the  best  police  and  administration  of  the 
school  consists  in  leaving  full  freedom  to  the  pupils  to  study 
and  to  get  along  together  as  they  please. 

That  Tolstoy  was  the  merriest  of  playmates  with  the 
boys  in  his  school  and  that  he  was  sincerely  beloved 
by  them  we  know  from  the  testimony  of  Vasily  Morozov, 
one  of  his  pupils.  Morozov  soon  left  the  village  for 
the  city,  fell  into  the  depths  of  poverty,  became  a 
tramp,  and  in  his  despair  determined  to  drown  him- 
self: 

And  I  went  to  the  stream.  The  day  was  hot.  By  the 
stream  there  were  many  people.  They  were  bathing.  It  was 
as  noisy  as  in  a  public  bath.  I  sat  down  on  the  bank,  took  off 
my  boots — and  then  I  suddenly  remembered  how  I  and  all  the 
pupils  of  the  Ydsnaya  Polydna  school,  with  Lev  Nikoldyevich 
at  our  head,  used  to  bathe  in  the  pond  and  how  we  would 
show  him  our  skill;   we  would  jump  from  the  bank  one  after 


112  TOLSTOY 

another,  swim,  dive,  and  chase  one  another.  And  Lev  Niko- 
Myevich  would  lie  on  the  bank  with  his  head  propped  on  his 
hand,  and  would  laugh  with  all  his  might,  especially  when  some 
one  wanted  to  show  off  and  did  not  succeed. 

"Enough,  enough,  come  out!"  Lev  Nikoldyevich  would  say 
with  a  laugh.  "Dress  yourselves.  Murzik  there  is  getting 
chilled  through." 

And  he  would  watch  us  shivering  boys,  whose  arms  were 
shaking  so  that  we  had  hard  work  to  get  them  into  the  sleeves 
of  our  shirts.  Then  Lev  Nikoldyevich  would  make  us  run 
races  around  the  pond  in  couples.  More  laughter.  At  last 
L.  N.  would  shout:  "Boys,  let's  see  who  can  get  to  school 
first;  hurrah!"  And  he  himself  would  start  out  at  full  speed. 
We  would  run  after  him  with  shouts  and  screams,  jostling  one 
another,  stumbling  and  falling.  But  L.  N.  was  always  the 
winner.  .  .  . 

I  was  a  pupil  of  the  school  in  Y^snaya  Poly^na;  I  loved 
the  school,  and  I  loved  Lev  Nikoldyevich  also.  I  remember  that 
we  had  the  most  sincere,  childlike  attachment  for  him  and 
that  Lev  NikoMyevich  had  the  most  sincere  attachment  to 
us.  It  was  a  village  commune,  but  not  one  depending  on 
force — rather  a  commune  united  by  the  tie  of  love.  We  had 
no  jealousy  of  one  another  in  the  sense  that  Lev  NikoMyevich 
granted  something  special  to  one  more  than  to  another.  Such 
were  the  feelings  that  I  took  away  from  the  school  at  Ydsnaya 
Polydna.  Like  the  brand  of  Jerusalem,  it  has  remained  on 
my  soul  and  to  this  day  I  bear  it  there. — [In  On  Tolstoy  (Mos- 
cow, 1909),  pp.  128,  129,  132.] 

In  the  teaching  of  different  subjects  Tolstoy  was  not 
uniformly  successful.  Grammar,  for  example,  he  could 
never  make  interesting  to  his  pupils,  and  characteristi- 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  113 

cally — and  with  much  reason — came  to  the  following 
conclusion: 

Personally  we  [I]  are  not  yet  able  fully  to  renounce  the 
tradition  that  grammar,  in  the  sense  of  the  laws  of  language, 
is  indispensable  for  the  correct  exposition  of  thoughts:  it 
even  seems  to  us  that  boys  studying  feel  a  need  of  grammar, 
that  in  them  unconsciously  Ue  the  laws  of  grammar.  But  we 
are  convinced  that  the  grammar  that  we  know  is  not  at  all 
that  needed  by  the  pupils,  and  that  in  this  custom  of  teaching 
grammar  there  is  some  great  historic  misunderstanding. — 
[Ydsnaya  Polydna  School:  Writing,  Grammar  and  Penmanship.] 

Tolstoy  is  seen  at  his  best  as  a  teacher  of  composition, 
a  subject  in  which  even  his  detractors  must  admit  his 
competence.  He  tells  touchingly  how  he  suggested  the 
idea  of  a  story,  The  Life  of  a  Soldier's  Wife,  to  two 
bright  boys,  about  eleven  years  old,  and  cooperated 
with  them  in  the  development  of  it.  (Whimsically 
enough,  he  reprinted  in  his  complete  works  his  account 
of  how  this  story  was  written,  and  his  commentary  on  it, 
in  his  essay.  Who  is  to  Teach  the  Art  of  Writing;  We  to 
the  Peasant  Children^  or  the  Peasant  Children  to  XJsf, 
but  did  not  reprint  the  story  itself,  which  seems  never 
to  have  been  translated  into  English.)  The  tale  is  a 
simple  one,  the  life  of  a  little  lad  who  lives  with  his 
mother  and  grandmother  while  his  drunken  father  is  in 
the  army;  the  boy  describes  the  birth  and  death  of  a 
baby  brother  and  the  marriage  of  an  older  sister.  Finally 
the  father  returns,  reformed,  and  "after  that  we  lived^ 
well."    Tolstoy  did  no  more  than  keep  his  pupils'  minds 


114  TOLSTOY 

intent  on  the  incidents  of  the  tale;  their  insight  into  the 
situations  proved  better  than  his  own.  Any  attention 
to  external  details,  such  as  handwriting  or  spelling,  was 
fatal  to  interest.  The  little  peasants'  work,  he  claimed, 
contained  beauties  such  as  could  scarcely  be  found 
elsewhere  in  Russian  literature.  The  story  is  indeed 
excellent  of  its  own  sort;  perfect  handling  of  detail  has 
done  its  work. 

One  of  the  two  boy  artists  was  Vasily  Morozov, 
from  whose  reminiscences  of  Tolstoy  quotations  have 
already  been  given.  He  later  became  a  cabman  in 
Tula,  but  occasionally  he  did  bits  of  writing.  A  story  by 
him  is  printed  in  The  Messenger  of  Europe,  one  of  the 
foremost  literary  magazines  of  Russia,  for  September, 
1908.  Tolstoy's  preface  to  the  tale  deserves  quota- 
tion, as  an  expression  of  his  unvarying  literary  ideals: 

This  story  was  written  by  my  most  beloved  pupil  of  my  first 
school  of  the  year  1862,  at  that  time  the  dear  twelve-year-old 
Vaska  Morozov,  now  the  honored  sixty-year-old  Vasily 
Stepdnovich  Morozov. 

As  then  there  were  especially  precious  to  me  in  that  dear 
boy  his  sensitiveness  to  all  that  was  good,  his  affectionateness, 
and,  above  all,  his  unfailing  frankness  and  truthfulness,  so 
now  I  am  particularly  pleased  with  the  same  traits  in  this 
simple  story,  which  is  so  sharply  distinguished  by  its  truth- 
fulness from  the  majority  of  Uterary  productions. 

You  feel  that  here  nothing  has  been  thought  up  or  invented, 
but  that  what  is  told  is  just  what  took  place;  that  a  fragment 
of  life  has  been  seized,  and  of  that  peculiarly  Russian  life  with 
its  sad,  gloomy,  and  precious,  spiritual  traits. 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  115 

I  think  that  I  have  not  been  bribed  by  my  attachment  to 
the  author  and  that  other  readers  will  be  as  fond  of  the  story 
as  I  myself. 

In  the  teaching  of  literature  Tolstoy  was  similarly 
an  expert,  but  one  of  a  peculiar  sort.  His  pupils  were 
interested  in  Afanasyev's  folk  tales,  and  in  all  similar 
material  that  had  been  derived  straight  from  the  lips  of 
the  Russian  common  people,  and  they  loved  the  stories 
of  the  Old  Testament,  but  any  attempts  to  guide  them 
up  to  the  reading  of  Pushkin  and  Gogol  proved  futile. 
Words  could  not  be  explained  to  the  children;  they 
must  be  gradually  apprehended  by  being  met  again  and 
again.  The  stuff  written  by  literary  men  and  intended  for 
popular  consumption  was  nearly  always  a  flat  failure. 
Tolstoy  felt  that  a  whole  course  of  graded  reading  was 
needed  for  use  in  the  peasant  schools,  and  he  set  to 
work  to  prepare  it  in  his  series  of  Readers.  On  these  he 
labored  with  far  greater  ardor  than  upon  Anna  Karenin. 
In  April,  1872,  he  wrote  to  his  cousin,  the  Countess 
Alexandra  Tolstoy: 

I  am  getting  on  well,  except  that  old  age  begins  to  make 
itself  felt;  I  am  often  ill  and  am  hastening  to  work.  There  is 
more  and  more  work  ahead  of  me.  If  they  had  told  me  twenty 
years  ago  to  think  up  work  for  twenty-three  years,  I  should 
have  exerted  all  the  strength  of  my  mind  and  yet  should  not 
have  thought  up  enough  work  for  three  years.  But  now  if  you 
told  me  that  I  should  hve  in  ten  persons  for  a  hundred  years, 
all  of  us  would  not  be  able  to  finish  all  that  is  indispensable. 
My  Primer  is  now  being  printed  at  one  end,  and  at  the  other  is 


116  TOLSTOY 

still  being  written  and  added  to.  This  Primer  alone  could 
give  me  work  for  a  hundred  years.  For  it  I  need  a  knowledge 
of  Greek,  Indian,  and  Arabic  literature;  I  need  all  the  natural 
sciences;  and  the  work  on  the  style  is  terrible.  All  must  be 
beautiful,  short,  simple,  and  above  all,  clear.  Some  French- 
man has  said :  **  Clearness  is  the  courtesy  of  men  who  wish  to 
teach,  when  they  address  the  public." — ^And  what  is  worst  of 
all,  people  will  rail  at  me  for  this  toil,  and  you  first  of  all. 
In  your  circle  you  will  be  sure  to  find  my  style  vulgaire.  And 
I  cannot  neglect  even  the  opinion  of  your  circle,  because  I  am 
writing  for  everybody. — [Correspondence  vrUh  the  Countess 
A.  A.  Tolstoy,  p.  233.] 

Tolstoy's  labors  deserved  the  immense  success  that 
they  achieved.  His  series  of  fiive  little  books  contains 
fables  remodeled  from  iEsop  and  from  Indian  sources, 
stories  from  the  Arabic,  bits  of  natural  science,  rework- 
ings  of  Russian  ballads,  and,  most  interesting  of  all 
for  us,  original  stories  for  children.  From  the  Bible  he 
gives  nothing;  he  tells  us  that  he  found  it  useless  and 
even  injurious  to  tamper  with  the  language  of  that 
book.  His  own  stories  are  of  various  sorts;  tales  drawn 
from  the  people  themselves  such  as  God  Sees  the  Truth; 
incidents  of  child  life;  and  bits  of  his  own  experience 
such  as  his  adventure  with  the  bear  on  the  hunt,  and 
stories  of  the  bull-dog  Bulka  who  was  his  companion 
in  the  Caucasus.  Unfortunately  not  all  these  stories 
were  included  in  Tolstoy's  collected  works,  and  conse- 
quently some  of  the  best  have  never  been  translated 
into  English.     No  work  by  Tolstoy  is  more  perfect, 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  117 

for  example,  than  his  story  of  how  Httle  Philip  went  to 
school  for  the  first  time.  In  it  he  has  caught  the  child*s 
point  of  view  and  writes  without  condescension,  that 
most  vicious  of  pedagogical  vices;  he  has  the  secret  of 
simplicity,  even  as  the  man  who  wrote  the  story  of 
Joseph  and  his  Brethren.  The  tale  demands  quota- 
tion: 

LITTLE  PHILIP  (a  true  story) 

Once  upon  a  time  there  was  a  boy  whose  name  was  Philip. 
One  day  all  the  children  were  starting  off  for  school.  Philip 
got  his  hat  and  wanted  to  go  too.  But  his  mother  said  to 
him:  "Where  are  you  going,  Philip!'*  "To  school."  "You're 
too  small;  you  can't  go."  And  his  mother  kept  him  at  home. 
The  children  went  off  to  school.  Early  in  the  morning  his 
father  had  driven  off  to  the  woods;  then  his  mother  went 
away  to  her  daily  work.  In  the  hut  there  were  left  only  Philip 
and  his  grandmother,  who  was  lying  on  the  oven.  Philip 
grew  lonesome  all  by  himself;  his  grandmother  went  to  sleep, 
and  he  began  to  look  for  his  hat.  He  did  not  find  his  own; 
but  he  took  an  old  one  of  his  father's  and  started  for  school. 

The  school  was  outside  the  village  near  the  church.  When 
Philip  was  walking  through  his  own  neighborhood  the 
dogs  did  not  touch  him — they  knew  him.  But  when  he  had 
passed  beyond  it,  Fido  jumped  out  and  barked,  and  after 
Fido  a  big  dog,  Towser.  Little  Philip  began  to  run,  and  the 
dogs  ran  after  him.  Philip  began  to  cry,  stumbled  and  fell 
down.  A  peasant  came  out,  drove  away  the  dogs,  and  said: 
"Where  are  you  running  to  all  alone,  you  little  monkey.?" 
Philip  said  nothing  at  all,  picked  up  his  skirts  and  started  to 
run  at  full  speed.    He  ran  to  the  school.   There  was  nobody  on 


118  TOLSTOY 

the  porch,  but  in  the  school  he  could  hear  the  sound  of  chil- 
dren's voices.  Philip  was  scared:  *'What  if  the  teacher  drives 
me  off?*'  And  he  began  to  think  what  he  should  do.  If  he 
went  back,  the  dog  would  bite  him  again;  if  he  went  into 
the  school,  he  was  afraid  of  the  teacher.  A  peasant  woman 
came  past  the  school  with  a  pail  and  said:  "They're  all 
studying — what  are  you  standing  there  for?"  So  Philip  went 
into  the  school.  In  the  entry  he  took  off  his  hat  and  opened 
the  door.  The  school  was  all  full  of  children.  Each  was  shout- 
ing his  own  lesson,  and  the  teacher,  with  a  red  necktie  on, 
was  walking  up  and  down  the  center. 

"What  do  you  want?"  he  shouted  at  Httle  Philip.  Philip 
clutched  at  his  hat  and  said  nothing.  "Who  are  you?"  Philip 
was  silent.  "Are  you  dumb?"  Philip  was  so  scared  that  he 
couldn't  speak.  "Well,  then,  go  home,  if  you  won't  talk." 
Philip  would  have  been  glad  to  say  something,  but  his  throat 
was  dry  from  terror.  He  looked  at  the  teacher  and  began  to 
cry.  Then  the  teacher  felt  sorry  for  him.  He  patted  him  on 
the  head  and  asked  the  children  who  this  boy  was. 

"That's  little  Philip,  Kostyushka's  brother;  he's  been 
begging  to  come  to  school  for  a  long  time,  but  his  mother 
wouldn't  let  him,  and  now  he's  sneaked  off  to  school." 

"Well,  sit  down  on  the  bench  by  your  brother,  and  I'll  ask 
your  mother  to  let  you  come  to  school." 

The  teacher  began  to  show  Philip  the  letters,  but  Philip 
knew  them  already  and  could  read  a  little  bit. 

"Now  then,  spell  your  name." 

Little  Philip  said:    "F-i,  fi;  el-ip,  lip." 

Everybody  laughed. 

"Fine  boy,"  said  the  teacher.    "Who  taught  you  to  read?" 

Philip  plucked  up  his  courage  and  said:  "Kostyushka. 
I'm  smart;  I  understood  it  all  right  off.   I'm  just  awful  bright !" 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  119 

The  teacher  laughed  and  said:  "But  do  you  know  your 
prayers?"  PhiHp  said,  "Yes,  I  do,"  and  he  began  to  repeat  the 
prayer  to  the  Virgin,  but  he  said  every  word  wrong.  The 
teacher  stopped  liim  and  said:  "Wait  a  while  before  you 
boast,  and  just  study." 

After  that  Philip  began  to  go  to  school  with  the  children. — 
[A  New  Primer.] 

Tolstoy's  attempts  to  teach  art  to  his  peasant  children 
led  him  to  startling  conclusions.  He  reasoned  that 
the  enjoyment  of  art  was  a  natural  human  need,  to 
which  the  children  had  a  perfect  right.  But  he  found 
that  neither  the  children  nor  their  parents  could  be 
roused  to  an  appreciation  of  the  Venus  of  Milo,  or  of 
Beethoven,  or  of  Pushkin's  lyrics.  He  came  to  the 
characteristically  Tolstoyan  conclusion  that  the  masses 
were  not  below  Pushkin  and  Beethoven,  but  above 
them: 

I  became  convinced  that  a  lyric  poem,  such  for  example  as 
"I  remember  the  charming  moment,"  that  productions  of 
music  such  as  Beethoven's  last  symphony,  are  not  so  uncon- 
ditionally and  universally  good  as  the  song  of  VanJca  the 
Steward,  and  the  refrain,  Down  Mother  Volga;  that  Pushkin 
and  Beethoven  please  us  not  because  there  is  any  absolute 
beauty  in  them,  but  because  we  are  just  as  corrupted  as 
Pushkin  and  Beethoven;  because  Puslikin  and  Beethoven 
alike  flatter  our  perverted  irritability  and  our  weakness. 
THow  commonly  do  we  hear  the  threadbare  paradox,  that  for 
the  understanding  of  the  beautiful  a  certain  preparation  is 
needed!    Who  said  that,  and  how  is  it  proved.?    That  is  only 


120  TOLSTOY 

an  evasion,  a  loop-hole  from  a  hopeless  situation  into  which 
we  have  been  brought  by  the  falsity  of  the  tendency  of  our 
art,  by  its  being  the  exclusive  property  of  one  ckgg^  Why 
are  the  beauty  of  the  sun,  the  beauty  of  the  human  face,  the 
beauty  of  the  sounds  of  a  folk-song,  the  beauty  of  an  act  of 
love  and  self-sacrifice,  accessible  to  all,  and  why  do  they  re- 
quire no  preparation?  .l[.   . 

I  assume  that  tfie  need  of  the  enjoyment  of  art  and  the 
service  of  art  lie  in  each  human  personality,  no  matter  to 
what  race  and  environment  it  may  belong,  and  that  this 
need  has  its  rights  and  should  be  satisfied.  Accepting  this 
principle  as  an  axiom,  I  say  that  if  inconveniences  and  diflS- 
culties  arise  in  the  enjoyment  of  art  by  every  one  and  the 
production  of  it  for  every  one,  then  the  cause  of  these  in- 
conveniences lies  not  in  the  manner  of  its  transmission,  not  in 
the  spread  of  art  among  many  or  in  its  concentration  among  a 
few,  but  in  the  character  and  tendency  of  the  art,  about  which 
we  should  have  doubts,  both  in  order  not  to  inflict  what  is 
false  on  the  young  generation,  and  in  order  to  give  the  oppor- 
tunity to  this  young  generation  to  work  out  something  new  both 
in  form  and  in  content. — [Ydsnaya  Polydna  School:  the  Arts.] 

True  to  this  conception,  Tolstoy  concludes  his  ac- 
count of  Yasnaya  Polyana  school  with  the  words: 

The  aim  of  the  teaching  of  music  to  the  people  should  consist 
in  imparting  to  them  the  knowledge  of  the  general  laws  of 
music  that  we  possess,  but  by  no  means  in  the  transfer  to 
them  of  the  false  taste  that  is  developed  in  us. — [Ydsnaya 
Polydna  School :  Singing.] 

This  theory  as  to  the  art  of  our  time  is  essentially 
the  same  that  Tolstoy  expounded  twenty-six  years  latey 


I 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  Ul 

in  What  is  Art?  (1898),  though  he  there  condemns 
most  modern  art  as  essentially  had,  while  here  he  at  first 
terms  it  only  less  universally  good  thaji  popular  art,  and 
then  insists  that  its  lack  of  universality  comes  from 
its  appeal  to  "our  perverted  irritability  and  our  weak- 
ness." His  arguments  in  his  later  book  are,  however, 
entirely  different,  being  based  on  his  new  religious 
conception  of  life;  they  will  be  considered  in  due  time. 
One  may  here  emphasize  the  fact  that  while  his  support- 
ing arguments  change,  his  temperamental  preference 
for  the  popular  standard  remains  the  same.  This 
preference  is  based  on  the  doctrine  of  Rousseau,  that 
civilization  necessarily  causes  degeneration  in  the 
individual  man;  and  it  must  stand  or  fall  with  that 
doctrine.  If  we  reject  Rousseau's  teaching  in  favor 
of  the  sounder  view  that  civilization  contributes  to 
the  growth  of  certain  valuable  human  capacities,  though 
it  may  often  stunt  others,  then  we  have  to  consider  the 
question  whether  a  given  work  of  art,  a  lyric  by  Pushkin 
or  a  symphony  by  Beethoven,  appeals  to  our  finer  or 
our  baser  emotions.  The  quahty  of  the  emotion  aroused 
by  a  work  of  art  is  always  a  true  test  of  its  merit,  if 
the  test  be  applied  in  a  broad  and  sympathetic  manner; 
the  universality  of  the  appeal  of  a  work  of  art  can  be 
used  as  a  test  only  in  connection  with  other  criteria.* 
Tolstoy's  whole  theory  of  education,  no  less  than  his 
criticism  of  modern  art,  is  based  on  a  point  of  view 
identical  with  that  of  Rousseau.     His  originality  con- 

*  Compare  pp.  340-343,  below. 


122  TOLSTOY 

sists  mainly  in  applying  Rousseau's  ideas  to  Russian 
conditions;  in  carrying  out  in  actual  experience  with 
a  school  of  peasant  children  ideas  that  Rousseau  had 
enunciated  with  very  little  regard  to  working  condi- 
tions. (The  influence  of  Rousseau  on  Tolstoy  extends 
even  to  details;  in  teaching  singing  he  went  so  far  as  to 
use  Rousseau's  system  of  musical  notation.)  More 
than  this,  Tolstoy's  ideas  are  the  same  as  those  of  a 
whole  series  of  educational  reformers  since  Rousseau, 
through  Froebel  down  to  Madame  Montessori  and 
others.  Professor  Dewey's  Schools  of  Tomorrow  is  an 
enthusiastic  account  of  how,  under  American  conditions, 
different  teachers  are  endeavoring  to  apply  principles 
that  are  Rousseau's,  and  therefore  Tolstoy's.  The  same 
leaven  is  working  in  many  different  minds. 

Tolstoy  differs  from  his  fellow  reformers  only  in  the 
unsparing  consistency  with  which  he  attempts — not 
always  with  success — to  carry  out  the  principle  of 
individualism  in  education.  His  doctrine  that  the  school 
should  convey  only  information,  and  not  seek  to  in- 
fluence individual  character,  seems  to  be  his  own. 
This  principle  sprang  from  the  fact  that  he  had  not  yet 
worked  out  a  clearly  formulated  religious  and  moral 
philosophy.  As  he  tells  us  in  his  Confession  (chapter  3) 
he  was  trying  to  teach  without  knowing  what  to  teach. 
To  the  doctrine  that  he  professed  he  could  not  be  true 
in  practice.  As  we  have  seen  from  his  own  description 
of  his  work,  his  own  personality  inevitably  influenced 
that  of  the  children  with  whom  he  came  in  contact. 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  123 

Later,  when  he  had  formed  for  himself  a  clear  moral  and 
rehgious  ideal,  Tolstoy  straightway  demanded  that  all 
education  should  be  religious,  and  laid  it  down  as  a 
principle  that  the  example  of  a  teacher  is  the  most 
powerful  means  of  education.  "I  should  give  two  rules 
for  education,"  he  wrote:  "not  only  to  live  well  one- 
self, but  to  work  over  oneself,  constantly  perfecting 
oneself,  and  to  conceal  nothing  about  one's  own  life  from 
one's  children."*  He  had  now  discovered  a  religious 
sanction  for  education  such  as  existed  in  the  middle 
ages,  a  certainty  of  truth  as  to  ideals  of  life  that  justified 
a  man  in  communicating  those  ideals  to  others.  But 
his  new  religious  ideal  had  as  its  cardinal  principle  the 
doctrine  of  the  non-resistance  to  evil  by  violence,  that 
is,  an  abhorrence  of  all  external  compulsion;  the  com- 
munication must  come  through  the  infectiousness  of 
true  religion  embodied  in  hfe;  force  is  abhorrent  both 
to  religion  and  to  education. 

One  queries  whether  Tolstoy  was  right  in  his  un- 
measured repugnance  to  the  use  of  compulsion  in  edu- 
cation. The  answer  is  ready  at  once:  if  organized  so- 
ciety be  accepted  as  right,  then  compulsion  has  a  place 
as  a  last  resort  in  education  as  in  other  human  relations. 
The  duty  of  every  educator  is  to  let  the  individuality  of 
his  pupils  develop  with  the  least  possible  measure  of 
constraint,  yet  he  must  use  his  best  efforts  to  see  that 
these  pupils  develop  into  useful  members  of  society. 
Merely  to  acquire  a  legible  handwriting  involves  the 
*  Thoughts  on  Education  and  Instruction,  collected  by  Chertkov,  §2, 


124  TOLSTOY 

subjection  of  one's  personal  taste  to  the  convenience  of 
his  fellow  men.  Force  in  education,  as  in  government, 
is  a  last  resort;  voluntary  cooperation  is  the  ideal  to 
be  sought.  No  other  follower  of  Rousseau  inveighs 
against  discipline  as  does  Tolstoy.  Rousseau  himself 
does  not  reject  discipline,  but  in  his  theoretic  treatise, 
Emile,  he  simply  neglects  the  problem.  Tolstoy  him- 
self, when  he  grants  the  teacher  the  right  not  to  admit 
a  pupil,  recognizes  a  sort  of  negative  discipline.  Despite 
all  the  beneficent  influence  on  education  of  Rousseau's 
romantic  individualism,  Rousseau  is  not  the  greatest 
of  educational  writers.  That  place  of  honor  belongs 
rather  to  the  moderate  and  compromising  Comenius, 
who,  starting  from  a  system  of  Christian  anarchy  some- 
what like  that  into  which  Tolstoy  developed,  emerged 
from  it  into  the  recognition  of  broad  social  service  in 
the  world  as  it  is  at  present  organized. 

But  can  organized  society  of  today  itself  be  justified 
as  an  improvement  on  a  state  of  barbarism.^  This 
assumption  Tolstoy  emphatically  denies,  as  we  have  al- 
ready seen  (pages  93-95),  thus  showing  himself  a  true  dis- 
ciple of  Rousseau.  This  fundamental  quarrel  between 
Tolstoy  and  the  Liberal  worshippers  of  progress  de- 
pends on  their  different  standards  of  value.  The  Liberals 
admire  the  material  advances  of  humanity  and  can 
point  to  real  achievements.  Within  historic  times  the 
population  of  the  earth  has  enormously  increased, 
waste  places  have  been  settled,  communication  has 
become  more  swift  and  safe,  disease  has  been  checked. 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  US 

and  the  average  human  life  has  been  lengthened.  All 
this  can  be  demonstrated.  But  there  is  no  proof  that 
the  individual  man  is  any  happier  today  than  he  was 
two  thousand  years  and  more  ago,  or  that  his  brain 
capacity  has  increased.  A  Hottentot's  little  girl  enjoys 
her  toys  as  much  as  a  millionaire's  daughter;  the 
domestication  of  the  horse  probably  required  as  much 
brain  capacity  as  the  invention  of  the  locomotive. 
An  American  boy  who  uses  the  telephone  at  five  and  at 
fourteen  constructs  an  amateur  wireless  telegraphic 
apparatus  is  not  necessarily  an  inventive  genius.  Human 
society  is  more  complicated  than  it  used  to  be,  but  there 
is  no  proof  that  the  individual  man  has  advanced. 
Whether  we  prefer  his  present  state  to  his  former  one, 
whether  we  accept  the  commonplaces  of  the  news- 
papers or  the  "paradoxes"  of  Rousseau  and  Tolstoy 
depends  more  on  our  temperament  than  on  our  open- 
ness to  reasoned  conviction.  Nor  can  men  be  blamed 
for  resisting  the  attempts  of  a  better  organized  so- 
ciety to  assimilate  them;  the  present  struggle  against 
German  Kultur  has  in  it  a  certain  Tolstoyan  element. 
Individual  liberty  is  valuable  in  itself,  even  at  the 
cost  of  some  material  welfare. 

In  revolting  from  the  Liberal  faith  in  western  progress 
and  culture,  and  in  recognizing  the  right  of  the  Russian 
common  folk  to  educate  itself  in  whatever  way  it  might 
see  fit,  independently  of  western  models,  Tolstoy  ap- 
proximated to  the  Slavophiles,  with  their  faith  in  Rus- 
sian nationality  as  something  distinct  and  apart  from 


126  TOLSTOY 

that  of  the  west.  Similarly  in  his  view  of  the  emancipa- 
tion of  the  serfs  as  due  to  the  emperor  alone  he  joined 
them  in  their  idea  of  autocracy.  He  may  be  said  to 
have  accepted  the  Slavophile  ideal  of  a  free  people,  tak- 
ing no  part  in  government,  and  ruled  over  by  a  benevolent 
autocrat.  At  a  later  time,  when  he  returned  to  the 
bosom  of  the  Russian  church,  he  may  be  said  to  have 
temporarily  accepted  their  faith  in  orthodoxy.  Yet  one 
would  make  a  great  mistake  in  classing  Tolstoy  at  any 
time  in  his  life  as  a  member  of  the  Slavophile  party. 
He  lacked  the  historic  interest  that  was  at  the  root  of 
all  their  teachings.  His  autocracy  was  the  instinctive 
loyalty  to  the  tsar  of  a  soldier,  an  aristocrat,  and  a 
landowner  of  long  descent,  joined  with  a  dislike  for 
Liberal  talkers  whom  he  regarded  as  insincere;  his 
nationality  was  a  revolt  from  Liberal  theories,  joined 
with  a  most  genuine  affection  for  the  peasants  on  his 
estate;  his  orthodoxy  was  a  conviction  of  the  impotence 
of  Liberal  agnosticism  to  bring  peace  to  the  soul  such 
as  was  conferred  on  his  peasant  friends  by  the  Orthodox 
Church.  The  Slavophiles,  like  their  Liberal  opponents, 
reached  their  mental  attitude  by  a  process  of  abstract 
reasoning;  Tolstoy  was  brought  to  his  own  opinions 
partly  by  the  study  of  Rousseau,  but  mainly  by  his  in- 
dividual personal  experience.  All  three  items  of  the 
Slavophile  creed  he  later  cast  aside  with  loathing. 

To  sum  up,  individualism,  expressed  in  a  contempt 
for  traditional  and  accepted  authority  and  in  an  ardent 
love  of  free  personal  development,  is  at  the  basis  of  all 


t 


TOLSTOY  AS  AN  EDUCATOR  127 

Tolstoy's  educational  theories.  The  same  attitude 
will  later  be  shown  in  his  critique  of  the  state  and  of 
the  whole  existing  social  order.  His  subsequent  doctrine 
of  non-resistance  to  evil  by  violence,  which  he  made  the 
corner-stone  of  his  ethical  system,  is  not  the  cause  of 
his  anarchistic  theories  but  the  prop  and  support  of 
them.  (The  parallel  to  the  development  of  his  theory 
of  art  is  exact  and  striking.)  But  his  individualism  is 
far  removed  from  the  egotistic  self-cultivation  of  a 
Goethe  or  the  rebellious  self-assertion  of  an  Ibsen;  it 
is  an  individualism  of  method,  not  of  aim,  and  is  com- 
bined with  an  ideal  of  service,  of  self-sacrifice,  and  of 
recognition  of  the  claims  of  other  men.  Even  at  this 
early  period,  Tolstoy's  individuality  is  most  strongly 
marked  in  his  reluctance  to  hamper  the  development 
of  other  individualities.  And  an  aversion  to  the  use  of 
force,  even  for  promoting  aims  the  righteousness  of 
which  would  seem  self-evident,  is  already  the  main- 
spring of  his  instinctive  philosophy. 


CHAPTER  V 

life:  1862-78 

|0  Tolstoy's  married  life  one  may  apply  his 
own  words  at  the  opening  of  Anna  Karenin: 
"All  happy  families  are  like  one  another; 
each  unhappy  family  is  unhappy  in  its  own 
way."  And  to  this  one  may  add  that  happy  families, 
like  happy  nations,  have  no  history.  Tolstoy's  life  in 
the  years  following  his  marriage  was  prosperous  and 
uneventful;  he  was  absorbed  in  his  wife  and  children,  in 
literary  work,  and  in  the  care  of  his  estate. 

Tolstoy  and  his  wife  were  admirably  suited  to  each 
other,  and  their  devotion,  though  not  their  mutual 
sympathy,  remained  constant  until  almost  the  time  of 
Tolstoy's  death.  The  Countess  was  an  excellent  house- 
wife and  mother,  simple  and  practical,  patient  and 
forbearing,  an  admirer  of  her  husband's  genius  and  an 
aid  in  his  literary  work.  Perhaps  Kitty  in  Anna  Karenin 
is  her  nearest  portrait  in  her  husband's  writings.  To 
his  wife,  Tolstoy  was  absolutely  faithful;  the  loose  living 
of  his  earlier  years  he  now  laid  aside  forever.  The  pair 
had  thirteen  children,  of  whom  the  first  was  born  in 

July,  1863,  and  the  last  in  1888.    In  the  education  of  the 

128 


LIFE:    18612-78  1S9 

older  children  Tolstoy  himself  took  a  leading  part, 
carrying  out  so  far  as  he  could  the  principles  of  Rousseau's 
Emile,  and  the  Countess  did  her  best  to  act  in  accord 
with  his  views. 

In  a  letter  to  his  cousin  the  Countess  Alexandra 
Tolstoy,  written  in  the  autumn  of  1863,  Tolstoy  describes 
his  joy  in  his  new  life,  his  fresh  enthusiasm  for  literary 
work,  and  his  consequent  loss  of  interest  in  the  school 
that  had  so  absorbed  him  the  year  before; 

You  will  recognize  my  handwriting  and  my  signature;  but 
who  I  am  now  and  what  I  am  you  will  surely  ask  yourself. 
I  am  a  husband  and  a  father,  fully  content  with  my  situation 
and  so  wonted  to  it  that  in  order  to  feel  my  own  happiness,  I 
must  think  of  what  I  should  be  otherwise.  I  do  not  keep  pon- 
dering over  my  own  situation  (grubeln  has  been  abandoned) 
and  I  only  feel  my  feelings;  I  do  not  think  about  my  family 
relations.  This  condition  gives  me  an  awful  lot  of  mental 
scope.  I  have  never  felt  my  mental  and  even  all  my  moral 
forces  so  free  and  so  capable  of  work.  And  I  have  work  on 
hand.  This  work  is  a  novel  of  the  time  from  1810  to  1820 
[War  and  Peace]  which  has  been  completely  occupying  me 
since  autumn  began.  Whether  it  shows  weakness  of  char- 
acter or  strength — I  sometimes  think  both — I  must  confess 
that  my  view  of  life,  of  the  peasants,  and  of  society  is  now 
completely  different  from  what  it  was  the  last  time  that  we 
saw  each  other.  I  can  be  sorry  for  them,  but  it  is  hard  for 
me  to  understand  how  I  could  love  them  so  deeply.  How- 
ever, I  am  glad  that  I  passed  through  that  school;  that  latest 
mistress  of  mine  did  much  towards  forming  me.  I  love  chil- 
dren and  pedagogy,  but  it  is  hard  for  me  to  understand  myself 


130  TOLSTOY 

as  I  was  a  year  ago.  The  children  come  to  me  in  the  evenings 
and  bring  with  them  to  my  mind  recollections  of  the  teacher 
who  was  in  me  and  who  will  never  return.  I  am  now  a  writer 
with  all  the  strength  of  my  soul,  and  I  write  and  meditate  on 
my  work  as  I  never  before  wrote  or  meditated.  I  am  a  happy 
and  serene  husband  and  father,  having  no  secrets  from  any- 
body and  no  desire  except  that  all  should  continue  as  it  has 
hitherto. — [Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy, 
pp.  191,  192.] 

A  letter  of  January,  1865,  tells  the  same  story  of 
complete  happiness  and  contentment  at  home: 

Do  you  remember,  I  once  wrote  you  that  people  were  mis- 
taken in  expecting  any  happiness  in  which  there  should  be 
neither  toil,  nor  deception,  nor  grief,  but  where  all  should  go 
on  evenly  and  happily.?  I  was  mistaken  then;  there  is  such 
happiness  and  I  have  been  living  in  it  for  more  than  two 
years,  and  every  year  it  becomes  deeper  and  more  uni- 
form. And  the  materials  of  which  this  happiness  is  built  are 
the  most  unbeautiful:  children  who  (excuse  me)  befoul  their 
clothes  and  yell;  a  wife  who  is  suckling  one,  leading  the  other 
about,  and  at  every  moment  reproaching  me  for  not  seeing 
that  they  are  both  on  the  brink  of  the  grave;  and  paper  and 
ink,  by  means  of  whch  I  am  describing  events  and  the  feelings 
of  men  that  never  existed. — [Ibid.,  p.  198.] 

The  first  literary  work  that  Tolstoy  undertook  after 
his  marriage  was  Linen-Measurer  (Holstomer),  the 
story  of  a  horse;  with  this,  as  he  writes  in  a  letter  to 
Fet,  he  was  occupied  in  the  spring  of  1863,  but  for 
some  reason  or  other  the  tale  was  not  published  until 


LIFE:    1862-78  131 

1888.  The  story  is  as  thoroughly  didactic,  though 
not  in  so  obvious  a  fashion,  as  Black  Beauty,  The 
wholesome,  normal,  natural  life  of  the  horse  is  con- 
trasted with  the  dissolute  and  vain  existence  of  its 
master  and  his  associates.  The  concluding  pages, 
which  tell  of  the  deaths  of  the  animal  and  the  man, 
handle  in  a  more  drastic  fashion  the  theme  that  Tolstoy 
had  already  treated  in  Three  Deaths. 

Two  comedies  that  he  wrote  in  this  same  year,  his 
first  experiments  in  the  dramatic  form,  have  unfor- 
tunately never  been  published. 

Tolstoy's  chief  occupation  during  the  early  years  of 
his  married  life  was  the  writing  of  War  and  Peace, 
on  which,  as  is  plain  from  the  letter  quoted  above,  he 
began  work  in  the  autumn  of  1863.  He  at  first  projected 
a  novel  based  on  the  aristocratic  conspiracy  of  December, 
1825,  against  the  Russian  government — the  conspiracy 
of  the  Decembrists,  as  it  is  called;  then  he  grew  in- 
terested in  the  earlier  life  of  his  characters,  and  com- 
posed a  huge  novel  centering  on  the  struggle  between 
Russia  and  Napoleon.  He  prepared  for  it  by  a  study 
of  the  archives  of  his  own  family  and  of  other  his- 
torical materials,  and  during  the  composition  of  it  he 
developed  the  peculiar  philosophy  of  history  that  he 
embodied  in  the  book.  His  habits  of  work  are  well 
described  by  his  wife's  brother,  Stepdn  Behrs: 

The  whole  life  of  Lev  Nikoldyevich  is  industrious  in  the 
full  sense  of  the  word.  ...  He  wrote  mainly  in  the  winter. 


13«  TOLSTOY 

all  day  long,  and  sometimes  until  late  at  nigkt.  .  .  .  Each 
morning  he  sat  down  at  his  table  and  worked.  If  he  did  not 
write,  he  prepared  himself  for  writing  by  the  study  of  sources 
and  materials.  Sometimes  before  his  work  and  after  dinner 
he  liked  to  read  English  novels.  Even  in  summer,  when  the 
children  were  having  a  vacation  and  his  wife  begged  him  to 
rest  and  not  to  work,  he  did  not  always  yield  to  her  request. 
In  the  most  conscientious  toiler  I  have  never  seen  such  se- 
verity towards  idleness  as  in  Lev  Nikoldyevich  towards  him- 
self.— [Reminiscences,  ch.  3.] 

The  Countess  Tolstoy  acted  as  her  husband's  sec- 
retary in  his  work;  and,  according  to  her  brother,  she 
copied  seven  times  the  entire  text  of  War  and  Peace. 
This  feat  seems  incredible  in  connection  with  her  other 
work.  Of  her  labors  on  Anna  Karenin  her  son  Count 
Ilya  Tolstoy  gives  a  description  that  will  presumably 
apply  equally  well  to  the  earlier  novel: 

My  mother's  work  seemed  much  harder  than  my  father's, 
because  we  actually  saw  her  at  it,  and  she  worked  much 
longer  hours  than  he  did.  .  .  .  Leaning  over  the  manu- 
script and  trying  to  decipher  my  father's  scrawl  with  her 
short-sighted  eyes,  she  used  to  spend  whole  evenings  at  work, 
and  often  sat  up  late  at  night  after  everybody  else  had  gone 
to  bed.  Sometimes,  when  anything  was  written  quite  illeg- 
ibly, she  would  go  to  my  father's  study  and  ask  him  what  it 
meant.  But  this  was  very  rare,  because  my  mother  did  not 
like  to  disturb  him.  When  it  happened,  my  father  would 
take  the  manuscript  in  his  hand,  ask  with  some  annoyance: 
*'What  on  earth  is  the  difficulty?"  and  begin  to  read  it  out 
loud.    When  he  came  to  the  difficult  place  he  would  mumble 


LIFE:    1862-78  133 

and  hesitate,  and  sometimes  had  the  greatest  difficulty  in 
making  out,  or  rather  in  guessing,  what  he  had  written.  He 
had  a  very  bad  handwriting  and  a  terrible  habit  of  inserting 
whole  sentences  between  the  lines,  or  in  the  corners  of  the 
page,  or  sometimes  right  across  it.  My  mother  often  dis- 
covered gross  grammatical  errors,  and  pointed  them  out  to 
my  father  and  corrected  them. 

When  Anna  Karenin  began  to  come  out,  .  .  .  long  galley- 
proofs  were  posted  to  my  father  and  he  looked  them  through 
and  corrected  them.  At  first,  the  margins  would  be  marked 
with  the  ordinary  typographical  signs,  letters  omitted,  marks 
of  punctuation,  and  so  on;  then  individual  words  would  be 
changed,  and  then  whole  sentences;  erasures  and  additions 
began;  till,  in  the  end,  the  proof-sheet  was  reduced  to  a 
mass  of  patches,  perfectly  black  in  places,  and  it  was  quite 
impossible  to  send  it  back  as  it  stood,  because  no  one  but  my 
mother  could  make  head  or  tail  of  the  tangle  of  conventional 
signs,  transpositions,  and  erasures. 

My  mother  would  sit  up  all  night  copying  the  whole  thing 
out  afresh. 

In  the  morning  there  lay  the  pages  on  her  table,  neatly 
piled  together,  covered  all  over  with  her  fine  clear  hand- 
writing, and  everything  was  ready  so  that  when  Levochka 
came  down  he  could  send  the  proof-sheets  off  by  post. 

My  father  would  carry  them  off  to  his  study  to  have  "just 
one  last  look,"  and  by  the  evening  it  was  just  as  bad  again; 
the  whole  thing  had  been  rewritten  and  messed  up  once  more. 

**Sonya,  my  dear,  I  am  very  sorry,  but  I've  spoilt  all  your 
work  again;  I  promise  I  won't  do  it  any  more,"  he  would  say, 
showing  her  the  passages  he  had  inked  over  with  a  guilty  air. 
"We'll  send  them  off  tomorrow  without  fail."  But  this  tomor- 
row was  often  put  off  day  by  day  for  weeks  or  months  together. 


134  TOLSTOY 

**  There's  just  one  bit  I  want  to  look  through  again,"  my 
father  would  say,  but  he  would  get  carried  away  and  rewrite 
the  whole  thing  afresh.  There  were  even  occasions  when, 
after  posting  the  proofs,  my  father  remembered  some  par- 
ticular words  next  day  and  corrected  them  by  telegraph. 

Several  times,  in  consequence  of  these  rewritings,  the 
printing  of  the  novel  in  the  RiissJcy  Vestnik  was  interrupted, 
and  sometimes  it  did  not  come  out  for  months  together. — 
[Reminiscences  of  Tolstoy^  pp.  137-139.] 

War  and  Peace  is  an  enormous  work,  in  fifteen  parts 
and  an  epilogue.  The  first  two  parts,  under  the  title 
The  Year  1805,  were  published,  like  Family  Happiness, 
Polikushka,  and  The  Cossacks,  in  the  Russian  Messenger 
(Russky  Vestnik),  edited  by  Katkov,  who,  beginning 
life  as  a  moderate  Liberal,  had  become  the  most  prom- 
inent Nationalist  and  reactionary  editor  in  Russia. 
To  Katkov's  political  views  Tolstoy,  in  a  letter  to  his 
cousin,  expresses  the  most  profound  indifference.  *'He 
and  I  have  as  much  in  common,"  he  writes,  "as  you 
and  your  water-carrier.  I  do  not  sympathize  with  their 
prohibiting  the  Poles  to  speak  Polish,  but  neither  am  I 
angry  at  them  for  it.  .  .  .  Butchers  kill  the  cattle 
that  we  eat,  but  I  am  not  obliged  either  to  take  them 
to  task  or  to  sympathize  with  them."*  This  is  merely 
another  instance  of  his  general  indifference  to  political 
questions.  From  Katkov  he  received  300  rubles  (about 
$225)  a  printed  sheet;  that  is,  six  times  the  "best 
authors'"  price  that  Nekrasov  had  promised  him  for 
*  Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  p.  210, 


LIFE:    1862-78  135 

his  early  work.  His  letters  to  his  wife  contain  references 
to  rather  vigorous  haggling  over  terms.  In  general, 
Tolstoy  at  this  time  of  his  life  was  eager  to  make  money, 
both  by  his  literary  work  and  by  the  management  of 
his  estate.  To  quote  from  Behrs :  "The  English  saying, 
*An  aristocrat  without  money  is  a  commoner,'  as  he 
said  himself,  made  him  anxious  to  increase  his  property 
for  the  sake  of  his  children."*  War  and  Peace  was  not 
completed  until  1869;  the  later  parts,  probably  in  con- 
sequence of  some  quarrel  with  Katkov,  were  not  printed 
in  the  Russian  Messenger,  but  were  issued  as  separate 
volumes. 

"In  his  farming,"  to  quote  once  more  from  Behrs, 
"Tolstoy  resorted  to  broad,  energetic  measures.  He 
raised  fine  blooded  cattle  in  great  numbers,  laid  out 
apple  orchards,  planted  a  large  timber  patch,  and  so 
on.  From  intellectual  curiosity  he  was  for  a  time  en- 
thusiastic over  bee-keeping.  He  himself  managed  only 
his  estate  at  Yasnaya  Poly  ana;  his  other  properties  he 
gave  over  entirely  to  overseers. "t  Of  his  attitude 
towards  his  own  farm  we  can  judge  suflSciently  well  from 
the  portra  t  of  Levin  in  Anna  Karenin, 

But  one  incident  need  be  mentioned  from  these 
happy  years  during  which  Tolstoy  was  at  work  on  his 
greatest  novel.  In  the  summer  of  1866  he  defended  on 
a  capital  charge  a  private  soldier  who  had  insulted  and 
struck  an  oflScer.  This  was  one  of  the  rare  occasions  on 
which  he  prevailed  upon  himself  to  speak  in  public. 
*  Heminiscences,  ch.  4,  |  /Wrf, 


136  TOLSTOY 

His  advocacy  was  unsuccessful  and  the  man  was  shot. 
At  a  later  date  Tolstoy  bitterly  regretted  having  lowered 
himself  by  taking  part  in  court  proceedings.  In  1908  he 
wrote  to  Biryukov: 

This  incident  had  an  immense  and  beneficent  influence  on 
me.  Through  this  incident  I  for  the  first  time  came  to  feel: 
first,  that  every  act  of  violence  implies  for  its  performance 
murder  or  the  threat  of  it,  and  that  therefore  every  act  of 
violence  is  inevitably  connected  with  murder;  second,  that 
a  state  organization  that  is  unthinkable  without  murders 
is  incompatible  with  Christianity;  and  third,  that  what  we 
call  science  is  only  the  same  sort  of  false  justification  of  the 
evil  that  exists  as  the  church  teaching  was  in  former  times. 
Now  this  is  clear  to  me;  then  it  was  only  a  dim  consciousness 
of  the  falsity  amid  which  my  life  was  passing. — [Biryuk6v: 

n,  104.] 

Of  home  life  in  the  Tolstoy  household  Count  Ilya 
Tolstoy,  the  second  son,  has  given  vivid  pictures  in  his 
Reminiscences,  With  his  boys  Tolstoy  was  a  merry  play- 
mate, amusing  them  with  comic  verses,  taking  them  with 
him  on  his  favorite  sport  of  shooting  woodcock,  playing 
the  bear  at  a  Christmas  festival,  and  inventing  for  their 
benefit  an  excellent  new  game  of  "Numidian  Cavalry": 

We  would  all  be  sitting  ....  rather  flat  and  quiet 
after  the  departure  of  some  dull  visitors.  Up  would  jump  my 
father  from  his  chair,  lifting  one  hand  in  the  air,  and  run  at 
full  speed  round  the  table  at  a  hopping  gallop.  We  all  flew 
after  him,  hopping  and  waving  our  hands  like  [sic]  he  did. 
We  would  run  round  the  room  several  times  and  sit  down  again 


LIFE:    1862-78  137 

panting  in  our  chairs  and  in  quite  a  different  frame  of  mind, 
gay  and  lively.  The  Numidian  Cavalry  had  an  excellent  effect 
many  and  many  a  time.  After  that  exercise  all  sorts  of 
quarrels  and  wrongs  were  forgotten,  and  tears  dried  with 
marvelous  rapidity. — [Reminiscences  of  Tolstoy,  p.  98.] 

The  children  were  well  brought  up  in  rules  of  courtesy. 
"When  they  needed  something  of  a  servant,  they 
were  forbidden  to  give  orders.  They  were  obliged  to 
make  a  request,  adding  without  fail  the  word  please. 
Their  parents  and  the  rest  of  the  family  set  them  an 
example  in  this."*  On  the  other  hand  the  aristocratic 
tradition  was  strong  in  the  home: 

We  were  educated  as  regular  "gentlefolk,"  proud  of  our 
social  position  and  holding  aloof  from  all  the  outer  world. 
Everything  that  was  not  us  was  below  us,  and  therefore 
unworthy  of  imitation.  When  our  neighbor  Alexander  Nikold- 
yevich  Blbikov  and  his  son  Nik61enka  were  asked  to  our 
Christmas  tree,  we  used  to  take  note  of  everything  that 
Nik61enka  did  that  wasn't  "the  thing,"  and  afterwards  used 
"Nikolenka  Bibikov"  as  a  term  of  abuse  among  ourselves, 
considering  that  there  was  nobody  in  the  world  so  stupid  and 
contemptible  as  he  was.  And  we  regarded  Nikolenka  in  this  light 
because  we  could  see  that  papa  regarded  his  father  in  the  same 
way. — [Count  Ilya  Tolstoy,  Reminiscences  of  Tolstoy,  p.  308.] 

The  son  speaks  with  admiration  of  his  father's  skill 
as  an  educator: 

My  father  hardly  ever  made  us  do  anything;  but  it  always 
somehow  came  about  that  of  our  own  initiative  we  did  exactly 
*  Behrs,  Reminiscences,  ch.  3. 


138  TOLSTOY 

what  he  wanted  us  to.  My  mother  often  scolded  us  and 
punished  us;  but  when  my  father  wanted  to  make  us  do  some- 
thing he  merely  looked  us  hard  in  the  eyes,  and  we  under- 
stood; his  look  was  far  more  effective  than  any  command.  .  .  . 
My  father's  great  power  as  an  educator  lay  in  this,  that 
it  was  as  impossible  to  conceal  anything  from  him  as  from 
one's  own  conscience.  He  knew  everything,  and  to  deceive 
him  was  just  like  deceiving  oneself;  it  was  nearly  impossible 
and  quite  useless. — [Ibid.,  pp.  313,  314.] 

Despite  his  deep  feelings,  Tolstoy  never  indulged  in 
outward  tenderness  towards  his  children: 

There  was  one  distinguishing  and  at  first  sight  peculiar 
trait  in  my  father's  character — due  perhaps  to  the  fact  that 
he  grew  up  without  a  mother,  or  perhaps  implanted  in  him 
by  Nature — and  that  was  that  all  exhibitions  of  tenderness 
were  entirely  foreign  to  him.  I  say  "tenderness**  in  con- 
tradistinction to  "feeling."  Feeling  he  had,  and  in  a  very 
high  degree.  .  .  . 

During  all  his  lifetime  I  never  received  any  mark  of  tender- 
ness from  him  whatever.  He  was  not  fond  of  kissing  children 
and  when  he  did  so  in  saying  good-morning  or  good-night  he 
did  it  merely  as  a  duty.  It  is  easy  therefore  to  understand 
that  he  did  not  provoke  any  display  of  tenderness  towards 
himself  and  that  nearness  and  dearness  w^ith  him  was  never 
accompanied  by  any  outward  manifestations. — [Ibid.,  pp.  377, 
378.] 

Among  the  inmates  of  the  Tolstoy  household  was 
Tolstoy's  old  "aunt"  Tatyana  Ergolsky,  the  best  loved 
of  all  his  elder  relatives.    It  was  she  who  furnished  the 


LIFE:   1862-78  139 

model  of  Sonya  in  War  and  Peace,   She  died  in  1874.    Of 
her  he  wrote: 

Auntie  Tatyana  Alexdndrovna  had  the  greatest  influence 
on  my  Hfe.  She  influenced  me,  in  the  first  place,  by  teaching 
me,  while  I  was  still  a  child,  the  spiritual  delight  of  love.  She 
did  not  teach  me  this  by  words,  but  by  her  whole  being  she 
infected  me  with  love.  I  saw  and  felt  how  good  it  was  for  her 
to  love,  and  I  came  to  understand  the  happiness  of  love.  That 
is  the  first  point.  The  second  point  is  that  she  taught  me  the 
charm  of  a  leisurely,  solitary  life. — [Biryuk6v:  I,  73.] 

After  the  completion  oiWar  and  Peace  Tolstoy  for  some 
time  undertook  no  further  creative  work,  but  plunged 
into  a  period  of  reading  and  study.  His  first  enthusiasm 
was  Schopenhauer.    In  September,  1869,  he  wrote  to  Fet: 

Do  you  know  what  this  summer  has  meant  for  me.'^  An 
unceasing  enthusiasm  for  Schopenhauer  and  a  succession  of 
spiritual  delights  such  as  I  have  never  before  experienced.  I 
have  procured  all  his  works  and  have  been  reading  them  and 
still  am  doing  so — I  have  also  read  through  Kant.  And 
surely  not  a  single  student  in  his  [university]  course  ever  studied 
so  much  and  learned  so  much  as  I  this  summer.  I  do  not 
know  whether  I  shall  ever  change  my  opinion,  but  now  I 
am  convinced  that  Schopenhauer  is  the  greatest  genius  of 
humankind  ....  [His  works]  are  a  whole  world  in  an  un- 
believably clear  and  beautiful  reflection.  I  have  begun  to 
translate  him. — [Biryuk6v:  11,  78,  79.] 

Evidently  Tolstoy's  pessimistic  conception  of  the  outer 
world,  of  which  he  speaks  ten  years  later  in  his  Con- 
fessiony  was  already  distinctly  formed. 


140  TOLSTOY 

In  the  next  year,  1870,  prompted  by  a  wish  to  aid 
in  the  education  of  his  eldest  son,  Tolstoy  suddenly  took 
up  the  study  of  Greek,  into  which  he  threw  himself  with 
his  usual  ardor.  Greek  appealed  to  him  from  the  side 
of  his  delight  in  the  beauty  of  the  world,  and  from 
his  passion  for  clear,  concrete  expression.  His  love  of 
Homer  has  already  been  noted  (p.  68).  Now  he  writes  to 
Fet: 

I  have  read  through  Xenophon  and  now  am  reading  him  d 
livre  ouvert.  For  Homer  I  need  a  lexicon  and  a  little  effort. 
I  am  impatiently  waiting  for  a  chance  to  show  some  one 
this  trick.  But  how  happy  I  am  that  God  has  sent  this  folly 
upon  me.  In  the  first  place  I  am  enjoying  myself;  in  the 
second  I  am  convinced  that  of  all  true  beauty  and  simple 
beauty  that  has  been  produced  by  human  speech  I  have  hither- 
to known  nothing,  like  all  men — they  know  but  they  under- 
stand not;  in  the  third  place  I  am  sure  that  I  am  not  writing 
verbose  twaddle  and  shall  never  do  so  any  more. — [Biryuk6v :  II, 
170.1 

Perhaps  the  study  of  Greek  was  of  some  influence  on 
Tolstoy's  style,  leading  him  more  than  ever  to  cultivate 
simplicity  and  directness.  But  on  the  whole  it  was 
important  only  as  furnishing  him  a  tool  for  his  later 
work  on  the  Gospels.  The  ascetic,  renunciatory  side  of 
his  nature  was  already  gaining  the  upper  hand,  and  his 
native  Hellenic  joy  in  life  was  becoming  less  important 
as  an  influence  in  his  thought. 

Owing  to  excessive  study,  Tolstoy's  health  weakened, 
and  in  June,  1871,  his  wife  persuaded  him  to  go  once 


LIFE:    186^-78  141 

more  to  the  province  of  Samara  for  a  kumys  cure. 
His  companion  on  the  trip  was  her  brother,  Stepdn 
Behrs,  who  has  given  an  entertaining  account  of  it  in  his 
Reminiscences.  Like  a  true  aristocrat,  Tolstoy  never 
traveled  second  class;  on  the  steamer  to  Samara  he 
rode  in  the  third  class  and  he  came  back  in  the  first: 

Lev  Nikoldyevich  has  a  remarkable  capacity  for  getting  on 
intimate  terms  with  passengers  of  all  classes.  Even  when  he 
came  across  sullen  and  reserved  strangers,  he  never  hesitated 
to  approach  them,  and,  after  a  few  attempts,  he  successfully 
engaged  them  in  conversation.  His  talent  as  a  psychologist 
and  his  heart  showed  him  the  right  methods  and  he  knew 
how  to  attract  strangers  by  his  sympathy.  In  the  course  of 
two  days  on  the  steamer  he  became  acquainted  with  the 
whole  deck,  not  excepting  even  the  good-natured  sailors, 
with  whom  we  spent  our  nights  in  the  bow  of  the  steamer. — 
[Behrs:    Reminiscences,  ch.  5.] 

On  the  steppes  Tolstoy  lived  for  six  weeks  in  a  felt 
tent  among  the  Bashkir  nomads,  drinking  the  fermented 
mare's  milk  and  eating  only  meat.  He  had  brought 
his  Greek  books  with  him,  and  he  wrote  back  to  Fet: 
"I  am  reading  Herodotus,  who  describes  in  detail  and 
with  great  fidelity  these  same  galactophagous  Scythians 
among  whom  I  am  living."*  Ever  quick  of  sympathy, 
Tolstoy  made  warm  friends  even  among  these  semi- 
savages.  Here  too  he  met  an  Orthodox  hermit  and  a 
leader  of  the  heretical  sect  of  the  Molokane,  and  listened 
with  attention  to  their  religious  discourses.  This  is  the 
♦Biryukov:  11,178. 


142  TOLSTOY 

first  token  of  Tolstoy's  interest  in  Russian  sectarianism. 
The  Greek  lexicon  was  brought  home  filled  with  aromatic 
steppe  flowers. 

On  this  journey  Tolstoy  bought  a  large  estate  in 
the  province  of  Samara  and  in  the  following  summers 
he  repeatedly  visited  it.  In  1873  his  family  accompanied 
him.  At  this  time  the  peasants  of  that  region  were 
suffering  from  a  severe  famine,  the  very  existence  of 
which  had  been  kept  secret  from  Russian  society  at  large. 
Prompted  by  his  wife,  Tolstoy  made  a  careful  personal 
investigation  of  conditions  and  sent  to  Katkov's  paper, 
the  Moscow  Gazette,  a  detailed  account  of  them,  with 
an  appeal  for  aid.  He  also  wrote  to  the  Countess 
Alexandra  Tolstoy  in  St.  Petersburg,  begging  her  to 
interest  in  the  cause  "the  strong  and  the  good  people 
of  this  world,  who,  fortunately,  are  one  and  the  same." 
"Your  Magdalens  are  very  pitiable,  I  know,"  he  tells 
her;  "but  pity  for  them,  as  for  all  the  sufferings  of  the 
soul,  is  more  mental — of  the  heart  if  you  prefer;  but 
simple,  good  people,  healthy  physically  and  morally, 
when  they  suffer  from  privation,  one  pities  with  his 
whole  being — one  is  ashamed  and  pained  to  be  a  man 
when  he  watches  their  sufferings.  So  I  deliver  into 
your  hands  this  important  matter,  which  is  near  to 
my  heart."*  These  appeals  were  marvelously  suc- 
cessful. In  the  course  of  1873  and  1874  contributions 
to  the  value  of  about  2,000,000  rubles  were  received  in 
aid  of  the  population  of  the  government  of  Samara; 
*  Correapondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  p.  247. 


LIFE:    1862-78  143 

the  empress  was  one  of  the  first  to  make  a  contribution. 
In  1881,  traditions  of  Tolstoy's  personal  help  were  still 
alive  among  the  peasants  of  his  district;  they  remem- 
bered how  he  personally  visited  the  most  afflicted 
houses,  aiding  with  grain  and  with  money  for  the  pur- 
chase of  horses.*  This  episode  in  Tolstoy's  life  is 
a  foretaste  of  his  more  famous  activity  during  the 
famine  of  1891-93. 

At  this  period  of  his  life,  though  his  membership  in 
the  Orthodox  Church  was  a  mere  formality,  Tolstoy 
was  by  no  means  an  opponent  of  reKgious  ceremonies. 
In  War  and  Peace  (part  ix,  ch.  18)  he  describes  with 
sympathy  the  profound  impression  made  on  Natasha 
by  the  solemn  church  service.  With  this  one  may 
compare  his  account  of  his  own  feelings  given  in  a  letter 
to  Fet  written  early  in  1872: 

What  do  I  understand  by  religious  awe?  Just  this.  Re- 
cently I  visited  my  brother — and  his  child  had  died  and 
was  being  buried.  The  priests  had  come  and  there  was  a 
pink  coffin — everything  in  due  form.  My  brother  and  I 
involuntarily  expressed  to  each  other  a  feeling  of  almost  dis- 
gust for  all  this  ceremony.  But  then  I  thought:  What  could 
my  brother  have  done  in  order  to  remove  finally  from  the 
house  the  decomposing  body  of  the  child?  How  could  he  finish 
the  matter  decently?  There  was  no  better  way  (at  least  I 
could  think  of  none)  than  with  a  requiem,  incense,  and  so 
forth.  How  should  one  himself  grow  weak  and  die?  Pray 
under  his  breath  ....  and  nothing  more?    That  is  not 

*  Biryukov:  II,  188. 


144  TOLSTOY 

right.  One  wishes  fully  to  express  the  significance  and  the 
importance,  the  impressiveness  and  the  religious  awfulnfess 
of  this  greatest  event  in  the  life  of  every  man.  And  I  could 
also  think  up  nothing  more  decent  for  all  ages,  for  all  stages 
of  development,  than  the  religious  setting.  For  me  at  least 
these  Slavic  words  are  redolent  of  exactly  the  same  meta- 
physical ecstasy  that  you  experience  when  you  think  of  nirvana. 
Religion  is  marvelous  in  that  for  so  many  ages,  to  so  many 
millions  of  men,  it  has  rendered  this  service,  the  greatest 
service  that  in  this  matter  anything  human  can  render.  With 
such  a  problem  how  can  religion  be  logical?  Yet  there  is 
something  in  it. — [Biryuk6v:  II,  235.] 

In  September,  1872,  an  incident  occurred  that,  like 
the  search  of  his  premises  by  the  police  ten  years  before, 
proves  conclusively  that  Tolstoy's  temperamental  dis- 
like for  liberalism  might  have  disappeared  with  advanc- 
ing experience,  had  not  first  his  social  position  and  his 
wealth,  and  later  his  literary  fame,  preserved  him  from 
any  but  the  most  trifling  annoyance  by  the  government 
authorities.  A  letter  to  the  Countess  Alexandra  Tolstoy 
tells  of  both  the  event  and  the  feelings  evoked  by  it : 

Dear  Alexandrine:  You  are  one  of  those  people  who  with 
their  whole  being  say  to  their  friends:  *'I  will  share  with  thee 
thy  sorrows  and  thou  thy  joys  with  me."  *  So  I,  who  always 
tell  you  of  my  own  happiness,  now  seek  your  sympathy  in  my 
grief. 

Unexpectedly  and  without  warning  an  event  has  descended 
upon  me  that  has  changed  my  whole  life. 

A  young  bull  at  Ydsnaya  Polydna  has  killed  a  herdsman 
*  The  quotation  is  in  English  in  the  original. 


LIFE:    1862-78  145 

and  I  am  held  for  examination,  under  arrest — I  cannot  leave 
the  house  (all  this  by  the  caprice  of  a  boy  called  the  public 
prosecutor),  and  in  a  few  days  I  must  face  charges  and  de- 
fend myself  in  court — before  whom?  It  is  terrible  to  think  of, 
terrible  to  remember  all  the  abominations  that  have  been 
inflicted  on  me,  are  being  inflicted,  and  will  still  be  infhcted. 

With  a  gray  beard,  with  six  children,  with  the  consciousness 
of  a  useful  and  industrious  life,  with  a  firm  confidence  that  I 
cannot  be  guilty,  with  a  contempt  for  the  new  courts  that  I 
cannot  help  having,  so  far  as  I  have  seen  them;  with  the  one 
desire,  that  I  should  be  left  in  peace  as  I  leave  everybody 
else  in  peace,  it  is  unbearable  to  live  in  Russia,  with  the  fear 
that  any  boy  who  does  not  like  my  face  may  make  me  sit  on  a 
bench  in  front  of  a  court,  and  later  in  prison — but  I  will  cease 
showing  my  anger.  You  will  read  all  this  story  in  the  press. 
I  shall  die  of  anger  if  I  do  not  vent  it;  and  then  let  them 
bring  me  to  trial  for  the  additional  offense  of  telling  the  truth. 
I  will  tell  you  what  I  intend  to  do  and  what  I  j)eg  of  you. 

If  I  do  not  die  of  anger  and  vexation  in  the  prison  where 
they  probably  will  put  me  (I  am  convinced  that  they  hate 
me),  I  have  decided  to  move  to  England  forever  or  until  such 
time  as  the  liberty  and  dignity  of  every  man  shall  be  made 
secure  in  our  country.  My  wife  looks  forward  to  this  with 
pleasure  (she  likes  English  ways)  and  it  will  be  a  good  thing  for 
the  children;  I  shall  have  sufficient  means  (I  shall  get  to- 
gether some  200,000  if  I  sell  out  everything).  I  myself,  how- 
ever much  I  detest  European  life,  hope  that  there  I  shall  re- 
cover from  my  anger  and  shall  be  able  to  pass  quietly  the  few 
years  of  my  life  that  still  remain  to  me,  working  at  what  I 
still  need  to  write.  Our  plan  is  to  settle  at  first  near  London, 
and  then  to  select  a  beautiful  and  healthful  village  near  the 
sea,  where  there  are  good  schools,  and  to  buy  a  house  and  land. 


146  TOLSTOY 

For  our  life  In  England  to  be  pleasant  we  need  to  be  acquainted 
with  good  aristocratic  families.  In  this  you  can  aid  me  and  I 
beg  you  to  do  so.  Please  do  it  for  me.  If  you  have  not  such 
acquaintances  yourself  you  will  surely  be  able  to  accomplish 
it  through  your  friends.  Two  or  three  letters  that  would 
open  to  us  the  doors  of  a  good  English  circle.  This  is  in- 
dispensable for  the  cliildren,  who  will  have  to  grow  up  there. 
When  we  leave  I  cannot  yet  tell,  because  they  can  torture  me 
here  as  much  as  they  choose.  You  simply  cannot  imagine 
my  situation.  They  say  that  the  laws  give  securite.  In  our 
country  it  is  quite  the  contrary.  I  have  arranged  my  life  with 
the  greatest  securite.  I  am  contented  with  little,  seek  nothing, 
wish  nothing  but  peace;  I  am  loved  and  respected  by  the 
peasantry;  even  robbers  let  me  alone;  and  I  have  complete 
securite,  except  from  the  laws.  The  hardest  thing  of  all  for 
me  is  this  anger  of  mine.  I  so  love  to  love,  and  now  I  cannot 
help  being  angry.  I  repeat  Our  Father  and  the  Thirty-Seventh 
Psalm,  and  for  a  moment  they  calm  me,  especially  Our  Father; 
but  later  I  boil  up  again  and  can  do  nothing,  think  of  nothing — I 
have  abandoned  work,  as  being  a  stupid  desire  to  take  ven- 
geance when  there  is  nobody  on  whom  to  take  vengeance. 
Not  until  now,  when  I  have  begun  to  get  ready  for  my  de- 
parture and  am  firmly  decided  on  it,  have  I  become  calmer, 
and  I  hope  soon  again  to  find  myself.  Good-bye;  I  kiss  your 
hand. — [Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A,  Tolstoy, 
pp.  235,  236.] 

This  letter  is  wonderfully  characteristic  of  Tolstoy's 
nature.  In  it  one  sees  his  deep-rooted  repugnance  to 
any  constraint  visited  on  him,  and  in  particular  to  com- 
pulsion from  the  new  liberal  courts,  which,  one  may 
remark,  were  modeled  on  French  and  English  institu- 


LIFE:    1862-78  147 

tions.  All  his  life  Tolstoy  had  chafed  but  little  under  the 
degrading  Russian  censorship;  now  he  was  anxious 
to  flee  to  England,  where,  one  may  hkewise  remark, 
he  might  easily  have  been  exposed  to  similar  attacks  on 
his  "liberty."  He  asserts  his  individuality,  and  yet 
(as  he  confesses  with  shame  in  a  later  letter)  he  has  the 
covert  hope  that  his  kinswoman  will  spread  the  news  of 
the  event  in  her  own  circle  of  high  government  officials. 
He  runs  to  religion  for  help,  but  finds  it  no  sure  resource 
against  his  boiling  temper.  "In  order  to  accept  as  a 
Christian  all  that  is  sent  by  God,"  he  writes  a  few  days 
later,  "you  must  first  feel  entirely  yourself,  but  while 
ants  are  crawling  over  you  and  stinging  you  it  is  im- 
possible to  think  of  anything  except  deliverance.  To 
accept  as  a  trial  sent  from  on  high  an  itch  that  is  pro- 
duced in  your  whole  being  by  insects  that  swarm  over 
you  is  impossible."*  The  affair  ended  by  the  court 
authorities  confessing  that  they  erred  in  arresting 
Tolstoy,  and  by  their  finally  admitting  that  even  his 
overseer  was  not  criminally  liable. 

Tolstoy's  irritation  was  increased  by  his  having 
undertaken  a  new  piece  of  literary  work,  which  ab- 
sorbed all  his  attention.  "And  when  you  are  attacked 
by  that  folly,  as  Pushkin  finely  called  it,  you  become 
peculiarly  sensitive  to  the  rudeness  of  life.  Imagine 
a  man  in  complete  quiet  and  darkness,  who  is  listening 
to  a  faint  rustling  and  who  is  scanning  faint  rays  of 
light  in  the  gloom,  under  whose  nose  they  suddenly 
*  Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  pp.  239,  240. 


I4g  TOLSTOY 

touch  off  stinking  Bengal  lights  and  play  a  march  on 
trumpets  out  of  tune.  It  is  extremely  torturing."* 
On  his  return  from  his  kumys  cure  of  1871  he  had  thrown 
himself  heart  and  soul  into  the  preparation  of  his  Primer y 
of  which  an  account  has  already  been  given,  and  had 
finished  it.  He  then  suddenly  became  interested  in  the 
study  of  the  epoch  of  Peter  the  Great  (1682-1725),  and 
particularly  of  the  part  played  in  it  by  his  own  an- 
cestors. He  buried  himself  in  the  study  of  historical 
sources,  both  public  and  private.  In  December,  1872, 
his  wife  wrote  to  her  brother:  "He  does  not  know 
himself  what  will  come  of  his  work,  but  it  seems  to  me 
that  he  will  again  write  a  poem  in  prose  similar  to 
War  and  Peace''^  After  making  several  attempts  at 
composition,  Tolstoy  was  forced  to  abandon  his  pro- 
ject, finding  himself  unable  to  re-create  in  his  imagination 
that  distant  period,  through  lack  of  knowledge  of  the 
details  of  Russian  life  in  the  early  eighteenth  century. 
He  had  formed  an  idea  of  the  personality  of  Peter 
in  sharp  contrast  to  the  prevailing  view,  and  the  whole 
epoch  had  become  unattractive  to  him.  The  personality 
and  work  of  Peter,  he  maintained,  were  not  only  in  no 
way  great,  but  all  his  qualities  were  bad.  His  so-called 
reforms  did  not  serve  the  good  of  the  country,  but 
only  his  personal  advantage.  In  consequence  of  the 
ill  will  that  the  boyars  (nobles)  bore  him  owing  to  his 
innovations,  he  founded  the  city  of  St.  Petersburg,  in 

*  Correspondence  ivith  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  p.  241. 
t  Behrs:  Reminiscences,  ch.  4. 


LIFE:    1862-78  149 

order  to  withdraw  from  them  and  to  be  freer  in  his 
immoral  Hfe,  among  the  foreigners  and  low-born  ad- 
venturers with  whom  he  surrounded  himself.  The 
class  of  boyars  was  then  very  influential  and  was  there- 
fore dangerous  to  him.  His  innovations  and  reforms 
were  taken  from  Saxony,  where  the  laws  were  the  most 
cruel  of  the  time,  and  corruption  of  manners  the  worst, 
a  fact  especially  pleasing  to  Peter.  This  explains  his 
friendship  for  the  Elector  of  Saxony,  one  of  the  most 
immoral  of  the  crowned  heads  of  the  time.*  In  this 
whole  conception  one  may  possibly  find  some  influence 
of  Slavophile  thought. 

Then,  in  March,  1873,  without  conscious  preparation, 
Tolstoy  began  the  composition  of  Anna  Karenin, 
Biryukov's  account  of  the  incident  demands  quotation: 

In  the  year  1873,  slowly  becoming  weaker,  the  beloved 
aunt  of  Lev  Nikoldyevich,  Tatyana  Ergolsky,  was  approach- 
ing her  end.  She  was  lying  in  her  room  on  a  couch,  and  the 
oldest  son  of  Lev  NikoMyevich,  the  ten-year-old  Sergey,  was 
reading  to  her  Pushkin's  tales.  Sofya  Andr^yevna  was  sitting 
near  by  with  her  work.  The  old  lady  dozed  off,  and  the  reading 
stopped.  The  volume  of  Pushkin  was  lying  on  the  table, 
open  at  the  beginning  of  the  story,  A  Fragment,  Just  then 
Lev  Nikoldyevich  came  into  the  room.  Seeing  the  book,  he 
took  it  and  read  the  beginning  of  A  Fragment:  "Guests  had 
gathered  at  a  country  house." 

"That  is  the  right  way  to  begin,"  said  Lev  Nikol^yevich. 
"Pushkin  is  our  teacher.  This  at  once  takes  the  reader  into 
the  interest  of  the  action  itself.  Another  would  have  begun  to 
*  Paraphrased  from  Behrs:  Reminiscences,  ch.  4. 


150  TOLSTOY 

describe  the  guests  and  the  rooms,  but  Pushkin  gets  down  to 
business  at  once." 

Some  one  of  those  present  jestingly  proposed  to  Lev  Niko- 
Idyevich  to  avail  himself  of  this  beginning  and  to  write  a 
novel.  Lev  Nikoldyevich  withdrew  to  his  room  and  im- 
mediately sketched  the  opening  of  Anna  Karenin,  which  in 
the  first  variant  began  thus:  **A11  was  in  confusion  in  the 
Oblonskys'  house."— [I:  204,  205.] 

As  the  kernel  of  his  plot  Tolstoy  took  an  incident 
that  had  happened  in  his  own  vicinity  about  a  year 
before.  A  woman  named  Anna,  who  had  been  living 
with  his  neighbor  Bibikov,  became  jealous  of  the  govern- 
ess in  the  household,  and  in  despair  threw  herself  beneath 
the  wheels  of  a  railroad  train.  On  this  new  novel  Tolstoy 
worked  fitfully  and  with  small  enthusiasm;  he  was 
hindered  by  family  griefs,  by  his  labors  on  educational 
problems,  and  probably  by  his  ever-increasing  preoccu- 
pation with  religious  questions.  In  1875,  writing  to  Fet, 
he  professes  complete  indifference  to  the  success  of  his 
work;  in  the  next  year  he  writes  to  the  same  friend: 
"I  am  now  taking  hold  of  the  tiresome  and  vulgar 
Anna  Karenin  with  but  one  desire:  to  get  it  oiit  of  the 
way  and  be  free  for  other  occupations."*  In  April, 
1876,  he  wrote  to  the  critic  Strakhov  of  his  antipathy 
for  work  on  the  last  proof-sheets  of  the  novel :  "  Every- 
thing in  them  is  wretched,  and  all  must  be  done  over, 
all  that  is  printed;  all  must  be  canceled  and  cast  aside; 
I  must  swear  off  and  say:  *  Excuse  me;  I  won't  do  so 
*  Letters,  collected  by  Sergey enko  (Moscow,  1910);  I,  116. 


LIFE:   1862-78  151 

any  more,  but  will  try  to  write  something  new  which 
shall  not  be  so  disjointed  and  helter-skelter!'  "*  The 
first  installments  of  Anna  Karenin  were  published 
in  Katkov's  Russian  Messenger  in  1875;  the  last  were 
not  ready  until  1877,  at  a  time  when  all  Russia  was 
seething  with  patriotic,  Slavophile  ardor  for  the  war  with 
Turkey,  to  secure  the  liberation  of  Bulgaria.  Katkov 
was  a  leader  in  the  war  party,  while  Tolstoy,  in  the  con- 
cluding chapters  of  his  book,  throws  cold  water  on  all 
military  and  patriotic  enthusiasm.  A  rupture  occurred 
between  the  two  men;  Katkov  refused  to  print  the  last 
chapters  as  they  stood,  while  Tolstoy  declined  to  alter 
them.  Katkov  was  obliged  to  print  a  mere  statement 
as  to  the  conclusion  of  the  novel,  while  Tolstoy  issued 
his  final  chapters  as  a  separate  pamphlet. 

Before  finishing  Anna  Karenin  Tolstoy  had  felt  new 
interest  in  The  Decembrists,  his  project  of  years  before, 
and  he  now  made  fresh  studies  of  materials  for  the 
book.  But  he  was  unable  to  obtain  permission  to  use 
the  government  archives  that  he  needed  for  his  work; 
and,  as  he  grew  more  intimately  acquainted  with  the 
Decembrist  conspiracy,  he  became  convinced  that  the 
source  of  it  was  to  be  found  in  the  influence  of  the 
French  Revolution  on  the  Russian  aristocracy.  A 
movement  imported  into  Russia  from  the  west  had  no 
charm  for  Tolstoy.  Besides  this,  religious  doubts  and 
questionings  were  now  pressing  upon  him.  He  def- 
initely laid  aside  his  novel,  but  in  1884  he  contributed 
*  Biryuk6v:  II,  213. 


152  TOLSTOY 

to  a  miscellany  a  few  fragments  of  it  that  he  had  written, 
partly  before  War  and  Peace  and  partly  after  Anna 
Karenin. 

During  this  period  of  Tolstoy's  life  his  two  most 
important  literary  friends  were  the  poet  Fet  and  the 
critic  Strakhov.  The  former  won  fame  by  lyric  poems 
expressing  the  "esthetic  epicureanism  that  developed 
on  the  soil  of  the  sybaritic  existence  of  the  Russian 
landed  proprietors."*  He  later  made  admirable  trans- 
lations from  the  Latin  poets.  Undoubtedly  inspired 
by  Tolstoy,  he  translated  Schopenhauer's  most  im- 
portant works.  Like  Tolstoy,  he  was  opposed  to 
the  Liberal  movement  and  was  politically  an  indifferent, 
holding  that  private  citizens  should  not  meddle  in 
government  affairs;  towards  the  peasants  he  is  said  to 
have  been  harsh  and  oppressive.  He  must  have  had 
attractive  personal  traits,  since  Tolstoy's  letters  to  him 
show  intimate  affection. 

Nikolay  Strakhov,  a  critic  of  the  Slavophile  school, 
was  dear  to  Tolstoy  on  both  intellectual  and  per- 
sonal grounds.  With  him  Tolstoy  could  discuss  re- 
ligious and  philosophical  problems,  and  Strakhov's 
opinions  on  his  works  were  almost  the  only  criticism  of 
them  that  he  valued.  Strakhov  was  his  intermediary  in 
the  printing  of  his  Primer.  Tolstoy's  attachment  to  Strak- 
hov was  apparently  never  interrupted,  while  his  intimacy 
with  Fet  came  to  an  end  in  his  later  years,  after  his 
religious  conversion. 

*  Skabichevsky :  History  of  Modern  Russian  Literature^ 


LIFE:    1862-78  153 

In  1876  Tolstoy  became  acquainted  with  the  com- 
poser Chaykovsky  [Tchaykovsky,  Tschaikowsky],  who 
had  long  been  a  devoted  admirer  of  his  works.  Chay- 
kovsky arranged  a  musical  evening  in  his  honor,  in- 
viting Rubinstein  to  play  on  the  occasion,  and  was 
beyond  measure  pleased  and  touched  when  Tolstoy  was 
moved  to  tears  by  the  performance  of  his  music.  But 
personally  the  two  men  could  not  become  intimate.  Ten 
years  later  Chaykovsky  wrote  in  his  diary: 

When  I  became  acquainted  with  Tolstoy  I  was  seized 
with  fear  and  a  feeling  of  awkwardness  in  his  presence.  It 
seemed  to  me  that  this  greatest  knower  of  the  heart  would 
penetrate  with  a  single  glance  into  all  the  little  secrets  of  my 
soul.  From  him,  it  seemed  to  me,  it  would  be  .impossible  to 
conceal  all  the  rubbish  lying  at  the  bottom  of  my  soul  and  to 
show  only  the  fair  side  of  it. 

If  he  is  kind  (and  such  he  must  be,  of  course),  I  thought, 
then  delicately  and  tenderly,  like  a  physician  who  is  studying 
a  wound  and  who  knows  all  the  sore  places,  he  will  avoid 
touching  and  irritating  them,  but  thereby  he  will  make  me 
feel  that  nothing  is  hidden  from  him.  If  he  is  not  specially 
merciful,  he  will  thrust  his  finger  right  into  the  center  of  the 
pain.  I  was  terribly  afraid  of  either  choice.  But  there 
was  no  sign  of  either.  A  profound  knower  of  the  heart  in  his 
writings,  he  proved  in  his  converse  with  men  to  be  of  a  simple, 
sound,  frank  nature,  showing  very  little  of  that  universal 
knowledge  of  which  I  was  afraid;  he  did  not  avoid  touching 
sore  places,  but  yet  he  caused  no  intentional  pain.  It  was 
evident  that  he  did  not  at  all  regard  me  as  a  subject  for  his 
observations,  but  simply  wished  to  chat  about  music,  in  which 


154  TOLSTOY 

he  was  interested  at  the  time.  Among  other  things  he  liked  to 
run  down  Beethoven,  and  openly  expressed  doubt  of  his  genius. 
This  is  a  trait  not  at  all  characteristic  of  great  men.  To  bring 
down  to  one's  own  lack  of  comprehension  a  genius  who  is 
recognized  by  every  one  is  a  peculiarity  of  men  of  limited 
intellect.— [Biryuk6v:  H,  252,  253.] 

This  sketch  of  Tolstoy's  life  during  his  greatest  creative 
period  may  fittingly  close  with  an  account  of  his  recon- 
ciliation with  Turgenev.  The  two  men  had  ceased  their 
enmity,  but  had  not  become  friends  again;  they  ad- 
mired each  other  at  long  range.  In  1862,  immediately 
after  their  quarrel,  Turgenev  had  written  to  Fet:  "You 
may  write  him  or  tell  him  (if  you  see  him)  that  I  (with- 
out any  phrases  or  plays  on  words)  from  a  distance 
like  him  very  much,  that  I  respect  him  and  follow  his 
fate  with  sympathy,  but  that  near  at  hand  everything 
takes  a  different  turn."*  Turgenev  revered  Tolstoy's 
power  of  picturing  external  life,  but  disliked  his  philos- 
ophizing and  his  incessant  brooding  over  questions  of 
conduct.  Of  War  and  Peace  he  wrote  in  a  letter  to 
Polonsky  (1868) :  "Tolstoy's  novel  is  a  marvelous  thing; 
but  the  weakest  part  of  it  .  .  .is  the  historical  side 
and  the  psychology.  His  history  is  a  mere  bit  of  trickery, 
a  flicking  of  the  eyes  with  fine  trifles;  his  psychology  is  a 
capriciously  monotonous  preoccupation  with  one  and 
the  same  feelings.  All  that  has  to  do  with  manners, 
the  descriptive  and  military  part,  is  of  the  first  order, 
and  in  it  we  have  no  such  master  as  Tolstoy."  He  made 
*Biryuk6v:  1.407. 


LIFE:    1862-78  155 

efforts,  apparently  unsuccessful,  to  procure  the  publica- 
tion of  French  translations  of  some  of  Tolstoy's  earlier 
works.  Tolstoy,  in  his  turn,  admired  Turgenev's  limpid, 
clear  style,  but  despised  his  lack  of  moral  vigor  and 
moral  questioning,  the  qualities  most  dear  to  himself. 
In  1867  he  wrote  to  Fet  a  caustic  verdict  on  Turgenev's 
new  novel  Smoke: 

As  to  Smoke  I  think  that  the  strength  of  poetry  lies  in  love; 
the  tendency  of  that  strength  depends  on  character.  With- 
out strength  of  love  there  is  no  poetry;  falsely  directed  strength, 
an  unpleasant,  weak  character  in  a  poet  is  repugnant.  In 
Smoke  there  is  scarcely  any  love  of  anything  and  scarcely  any 
poetry.  There  is  love  only  of  light  and  playful  adultery,  and 
therefore  the  poetry  of  that  story  is  repugnant.  I  am  afraid 
even  to  express  this  opinion,  because  I  cannot  regard  soberly 
the  author,  whose  personality  I  do  not  Hke,  but  it  seems  that 
my  impression  is  common  to  all.  One  more  man  played  out. 
I  wish  and  hope  that  my  turn  may  never  come. — [Biryuk6v: 
II,  77.] 

About  1876  he  speaks  of  his  former  friend  with  some- 
what less  lack  of  sympathy: 

I  have  not  been  reading  Turgenev,  but  I  am  sincerely  sorry, 
judging  from  everything  that  I  have  heard,  that  that  spring  of 
pure  and  limpid  water  has  been  fouled  with  such  rubbish.  If  he 
would  simply  recollect  in  detail  one  of  his  own  days  and 
describe  it,  every  one  would  be  delighted.  However  common- 
place it  may  sound,  yet  in  all  relations  of  life,  and  especially 
in  art,  one  needs  merely  a  single  negative  quality,  not  to  lie. 
In  life  falsehood  is  horrid,  but  it  does  not  destroy  Ufe  by  its 


156  TOLSTOY 

homdness;  under  it  the  truth  of  life  still  remains  because 
somebody  always  longs  for  something,  is  pained  or  made  joyful 
by  something;  but  in  art  falsehood  destroys  the  whole  con- 
nection between  phenomena;  all  scatters  like  dust. — [Ibid., 
n,  216.] 

In  1878,  Tolstoy,  whose  thoughts  were  turning  more 
and  more  on  religious  questions,  and  who  did  not  wish 
to  continue  to  have  an  enemy,  wrote  to  Turgenev, 
begging  him  to  forgive  him  if  he  had  wronged  him  in 
any  way.  Turgenev  answered  in  the  same  cordial 
spirit  and  in  the  autumn  of  that  year  made  two  visits  at 
Tolstoy's  home.  The  reconciliation  was  outwardly 
complete,  but  no  spiritual  sympathy  between  the  two 
men  was  possible.  "He  is  still  the  same,"  Tolstoy 
wrote  to  Fet,  "and  we  know  the  degree  of  intimacy 
that  is  possible  between  us."*  On  November  10,  in  a  let- 
ter to  Strakhov,  he  referred  to  Turgenev  with  whimsical 
condescension: 

Why  are  you  angry  with  Turgenev?  He  plays  at  life  and 
one  has  to  play  with  him.  And  his  play  is  innocent  and  not 
unpleasant,  if  taken  in  small  doses.  But  you  too  must  not  be 
angry  with  him. — [Letter  printed  in  The  Contemporary  World, 
July,  1913.] 

Soon  after  this  Tolstoy  received  a  letter  from  Tur- 
genev,  who   expressed   a   hope   that   the   "intellectual 
illness,"  of  which  Tolstoy  had  complained,  had  now 
passed  away.    The  tone  of  the  epistle  made  a  disagr'^e- 
*  Biryukov:  II,  279. 


LIFE:    1862-78  157 

able  impression  on  Tolstoy,  who  wrote  petulantly  to 
Fet: 

Yesterday  I  had  a  letter  from  Turgenev.  And,  do  you 
know,  I  have  decided  that  it's  better  to  keep  away  from  him 
and  from  all  chance  of  trouble.  Somehow  he  stirs  me  up 
unpleasantly. — [Biryuk6v:  II,  279.] 

On  his  side,  Turgenev  was  better  pleased  with  the 
renewal  of  friendship.    He  wrote  to  Fet: 

It  made  me  very  happy  to  meet  Tolstoy  again  and  I  passed 
three  pleasant  days  at  his  house;  all  his  family  are  very 
attractive  and  his  wife  is  charming.  He  himself  has  become 
very  gentle  and  has  grown  up.  His  name  is  beginning  to  be- 
come known  in  Europe.  We  Russians  have  been  aware  for  a 
long  time  that  he  has  no  rival. — [Ibid.,  II,  280.] 

He  himself  tried  to  aid  Tolstoy's  fame  by  distributing 
copies  of  the  French  translation  of  War  and  Peace  to 
such  distinguished  critics  as  Taine  and  About. 

All  in  all,  Tolstoy  evidently  regarded  Turgenev  as  a 
frivolous  babbler,  while  Turgenev  looked  on  Tolstoy  as 
a  wrong-headed  prig.    Both  were  mistaken. 


CHAFPER  VI 


\ 


"war  and  peace"  and  "anna  karenin" 


P^^^OLSTOY'S  fame  as  a  novelist  depends  pri- 
w  T^  m  marily  on  War  and  Peace  and  Anna  Karenin, 
His  earlier  works,  though  they  alone  would 
have  given  him  an  assured  place  among  the 
great  writers  of  Russia,  may  be  regarded  as  in  a  sense 
but  preliminary  studies  for  these  novels.  And  his 
religious,  ethical,  and  critical  writings,  remarkable  as 
they  are  in  themselves,  are  more  widely  read  owing  to 
the  fact  that  they  came  from  the  pen  of  the  author  of 
War  and  Peace  and  Anna  Karenin, 

War  and  Peace  was  the  fruit  of  the  happiest  and  most 
buoyant  period  of  Tolstoy's  life.  His  activities,  hitherto 
scattered  over  a  variety  of  aims,  were  given  a  definite 
direction  by  family  ties;  conscious  of  his  ripened  powers, 
he  applied  himself  to  creative  work  with  all  the  vigor  of 
his  impetuous  nature.  From  a  conventional  point  of 
view  the  masterpiece  that  he  produced  lacks  unity  and 
proportion.  A  very  competent  critic  has  described  it 
as  not  a  novel  at  all,  but  rather  a  vast  encyclopedic 
work  like  the  Anatomy  of  Melancholy ,  containing  ma- 
terial enough  for  a  dozen   novels,   jumbled   together, 

158 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"   159 

helter-skelter.  Tolstoy  himself  was  fully  aware  of  the 
nature  of  his  own  work.  ''War  and  Peace"  he  told 
Schuyler,  "is  not  a  novel,  still  less  a  poem,  still  less  an 
historical  chronicle.  It  is  not  presumption  on  my  part 
if  I  keep  clear  of  customary  forms.  The  history  of 
Russian  literature  from  Pushkin  down  presents  many 
similar  examples.  From  the  Dead  Soids  of  Gogol  to 
the  Dead  House*  of  Dostoyevsky  there  is  not  a  single 
artistic  prose  work  of  more  than  average  merit  which 
keeps  entirely  to  the  usual  form  of  a  novel  or  a  poem."t 
The  book  traces  the  history  during  the  years  1805-12  of 
five  families,  all  belonging  to  the  higher  circles  of  the 
Russian  aristocracy,  and  of  some  minor  characters,  and 
it  concludes  with  an  epilogue  laid  in  the  year  1820. 
In  its  two  thousand  pages  we  find  "God's  plenty," 
and  we  live  with  the  creations  of  Tolstoy's  art  as  with 
the  characters  of  no  other  novelist;  their  daily  existence 
has  for  us  the  same  charm  as  that  of  dearly  loved  friends. 
In  1871,  two  years  after  the  completion  of  his  great 
work,  Tolstoy  wrote  to  his  wife,  mournfully  commenting 
on  his  own  loss  of  health:  "I  have  no  intellectual,  and 
above  all  no  poetic  delights.  I  look  upon  everything  as 
though  I  were  dead,  the  very  thing  for  which  I  have 
disliked  mapy  people.  But  now  I  myself  see  only 
what  exists;  I  understand,  I  form  ideas,  but  I  do  not 
see  through  with  love  as  I  used  to  do. "J    That  phrase, 

*  House  of  the  Dead;  compare  p.  340. 

t  Eugene  Schuyler,  "Count  Leo  Tolstoy  Twenty  Years  Ago,"  in 
ticribners  Magazine:  V,  548.  Tolstoy's  generalization  is  naturally  not 
scientifically  accurate.  f  Letters  to  Wife,  p.  82. 


160  TOLSTOY 

"to  see  through  with  love,"  aptly  characterizes  the  un- 
failing charm  of  War  and  Peace;  the  superb  excellence 
of  single  characters,  single  incidents,  single  descriptions 
makes  us  impatient  of  captious  comments  on  the  de- 
parture of  the  book  from  ordinary  canons  of  construc- 
tion. Formal  criticism  stands  abashed  before  such  a 
work.    One  turns  with  relief  to  the  verdict  of  Holland: 

In  order  to  be  fully  sensible  of  the  power  of  the  work,  one 
must  take  account  of  its  hidden  unity.  Most  French  readers, 
who  are  a  trifle  near-sighted,  see  only  its  thousands  of  de- 
tails, the  profusion  of  which  bewilders  them  and  throws 
them  off  the  track.  They  are  lost  in  this  forest  of  life.  One 
must  rise  above  it  and  take  in  at  a  glance  the  free  horizon,  the 
circle  of  the  woods  and  the  fields;  then  one  will  perceive  the 
Homeric  spirit  of  the  work,  the  calm  of  eternal  laws,  the 
grand  rhythm  of  the  breath  of  destiny,  the  feeling  of  the  whole 
with  which  all  the  details  are  united;  and,  dominating  the 
work,  the  genius  of  the  artist,  like  the  God  of  Genesis  moving 
upon  the  face  of  the  waters. — [Vie  de  Tolstoi,  p.  62.] 

War  and  Peace  is  formed  of  numerous  elements:  pic- 
tures of  Russian  home  life  among  the  aristocracy,  in  their 
St.  Petersburg  and  Moscow  mansions  and  on  their 
country  estates,  with  revels  at  restaurants  and  whole- 
some merrymaking  in  the  family  circle  and  in  the  fields; 
and  pictures  of  life  in  time  of  war,  in  the  ofiicers'  mess- 
room,  on  the  battlefield  among  the  private  soldiers,  in 
panic-stricken  Moscow,  and  on  the  wintry  march, 
among  the  Russian  prisoners  carried  off  by  Napoleon 
on  his  retreat  from  Russia.    The  novel  has  an  historical 


"WAR  AND  PEACE**  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"   161 

setting;  no  small  space  is  given  to  portraits  of  Napoleon 
and  of  Alexander  I,  and  of  the  Russian  generals,  above 
all  to  that  of  the  commander-in-chief  Kutuzov.  Into 
the  work  Tolstoy  injects  whole  chapters  of  historical 
philosophy,  utterly  unconnected  with  the  narrative, 
but  justified  in  his  mind  as  a  commentary  on  the  central 
event  upon  which  the  book  turns  as  a  pivot,  the  in- 
vasion of  Russia  by  Napoleon.  And  finally,  Tolstoy's 
ethical  point  of  view,  though  still  unsettled,  here  be- 
comes more  articulate  than  in  his  previous  works; 
through  the  lives  of  his  two  chief  heroes,  Pierre  Bezukhov 
and  Audrey  Bolkonsky,  to  each  of  whom  he  imparts 
some  sEareof  his  own  personality,  he  gives  full  expression 
to  his  maturing  philosophy  of  life. 

The  first  element  is  the  most  important.  Home  life 
had  been  Tolstoy's  ideal  since  his  boyhood,  and  now 
it  had  been  realized.  His  work  is  pervaded  by  his  new 
interests;  it  is  the  epic  of  the  family;  the  family  ideal 
dominates  it  even  more  absolutely  than  it  does  the  work 
of  English  Victorian  writers  of  the  same  period.  In 
portraying  family  life  Tolstoy  drew  on  his  own  memories 
and  on  his  family  traditions;  the  two  households  that 
occupy  the  center  of  the  stage  in  War  and  Peace  are 
modeled  on  those  of  his  father  and  mother.  The  Ros- 
tovs,  open-handed,  simple-hearted  country  squires, 
represent  the  Tolstoys;  Nikolay  Rostov  and  his  father 
are  portraits  of  the  author's  father  and  grandfather. 
But  Natasha  Rostov  was  not  taken  from  tradition;  in 
her  Tolstoy  combined  traits  of  his  wife  and  her  sister: 


I 


162  TOLSTOY 

"I  took  Tanya,"  he  is  reported  to  have  said,  "pounded 
her  up  with  Sonya,  and  Natasha  was  the  result."* 
The  Sonya  of  the  novel  was  suggested  by  Tolstoy's 
beloved  "aunt"  Tatyana  Ergolsky.  The  Bolkonskys, 
on  the  other  hand,  a  reflective,  intellectual,  independent, 
forceful  family,  are  modified  copies  of  the  Volkonskys, 
the  family  of  Tolstoy's  mother.  His  mother  herself 
is  represented  by  the  pure-hearted  but  externally  un- 
attractive Princess  Mary  a;  while  his  maternal  grand- 
father furnished  the  model  of  the  eccentric  old  Prince 
Bolkonsky.  All  these  identifications,  however,  must  be 
accepted  with  a  certain  reserve.  Tolstoy  himself,  ac- 
cording to  his  son,  disliked  questions  as  to  the  exact 
sources  of  the  characters  that  he  created,  and  "used  to 
say  that  a  writer  forms  his  types  from  a  whole  series 
of  people,  and  they  never  can  or  ought  to  be  portraits 
of  particular  individuals."! 

In  his  earlier  writings  Tolstoy  had  been  noticeably 
chary  of  feminine  portraits.  Now  he  presents  a  whole 
gallery  of  them,  drawn  and  colored  with  the  most  ex- 
quisite sympathy  and  skill.  One  among  them  stands 
preeminent. 

Wholesomeness  and  geniality,  a  hearty  delight  in 
mere  existence,  personal  kindliness  and  freedom  from 
reflection,  a  whole-souled  contentment  with  the  world 
as  it  is,  and  a  deep  aversion  to  anxiety  and  bother  over 
finances,   characterize  the  household  of  the  E-ost6vs. 

*  Biryukov:  II,  32,  on  the  authority  of  the  Countess  Tolstoy 
f  Count  Ily^  Tolstoy,  Reminiscences  of  Tolstoy,  p.  67, 


-'^Vii 


''WAR  AND  PEACE*'  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"   163 

All  these  qualities,  combined  with  an  artistic  tempera- 
ment and  a  girlish  love  of  the  whole  world,  combine  to 
make.  Natasha  Rostov  Tolstoy's  most  charming  crea- 
tion, and,  one  dares  to  say,  the  most  charming  heroine 
of  all  prose  fiction.  The  great  heroines  of  poetry  and 
romance,  from  Helen  of  Troy  to  Goethe's  Margaret,  are 
all  outline  sketches,  not  less  true,  but  less  complete  and 
many-sided  than  this  detailed  portrait  of  a  real  girl 
and  woman,  whose  life  was  the  reverse  of  romance,  and 
whose  destiny  the  plainest  of  humdrum  prose.  That 
Tolstoy  could  infuse  pure  beauty  and  poetry  into  a 
story  such  as  hers  would  alone  win  him  a  place  among 
the  master  spirits  of  literature. 

We  see  Natasha  first  as  a  girl  of  thirteen,  scarcely  out 
of  the  nursery:  at  a  statelyLJamily.„dLnaer_she- jdses 
and  demands  to  know  what  the  dessert  is  to  be,  and 
wilLnot  be  quieted  until  she  is  told.  Less  than  a  year 
later  she  wins  the  heart  of  the  rough  hussar  Denisov, 
her  brother's  friend,  and  is  childishly  grieved  that  she 
cannot  make  him  happy,  though  she  has  no  thought  of 
marrying  him : 

Natasha  ran  to  her  mother  in  great  excitement. 

"Mamma,  mamma,  he*s  made  me!" 

"What  has  he  made  you?'* 

"He's  made  me,  made  me  a  proposal.  Mamma,  mamma!'* 
she  cried.  The  Countess  could  not  believe  her  ears.  Denisov 
had  made  a  proposal.  To  whom.^  To  that  mite  of  a  girl 
Natasha,  who  had  only  just  left  off  playing  with  dolls  and 
was  still  taking  lessons. 


164  TOLSTOY 

"Natasha,  stop  your  nonsense!"  she  said,  still  hoping  that 
this  was  a  joke. 

"Nonsense!  I'm  talking  seriously  to  you,**  said  Natasha 
angrily.  "I  came  to  ask  you  what  to  do,  and  now  you  say 
*  nonsense'!'* 

The  Countess  shrugged  her  shoulders. 

**If  it's  true  that  Monsieur  Denisov  has  made  you  a  pro- 
posal, then  tell  him  that  he's  a  fool;  that's  all." 

"No,  he  isn't  a  fool,"  said  Natasha  with  a  grave  and  in- 
jured air. 

"Well,  then  what  do  you  want?  You  are  all  in  love 
nowadays.  K  you're  in  love  with  him,  then  marry  him!" 
said  the  Countess  with  an  angry  laugh.  "My  blessings  on 
you!" 

"No,  mamma,  I'm  not  in  love  with  him;  most  likely  I'm  not 
in  love  with  him.** 

"Well,  then  tell  him  so." 

"Mamma,  are  you  angry?  Don't  be  angry,  darling;  how 
am  I  to  blame  ?" 

"Then  what  shall  we  do,  my  dear?  If  you  wish  I'll  go  tell 
him,"  said  the  Countess  with  a  smile. 

"No,  I'll  do  it  myself,  only  you  show  me  how  to.  Every- 
thing is  easy  for  you,"  she  added,  answering  her  smile.  "But 
if  you  had  only  seen  how  he  said  that  to  me!  I  know  he  didn't 
mean  to  say  it,  but  just  said  it  accidentally.'* 

"Well,  anyhow  you  must  refuse  him." 

"No,  I  mustn't.    I'm  so  sorry  for  him!    He's  such  a  dear.** 

"Well,  then  accept  his  proposal.  It's  high  time  you  were 
married,"  said  the  mother  angrily  and  mockingly. 

"No,  mamma,  I'm  so  sorry  for  him.  I  don't  know  how  to 
say  it." 

"There's  no  use  discussing;   I'll  tell  him  myself,**  said  the 


**WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"   165 

Countess,  irritated  that  anybody  should  have  ventured  to 
regard  this  little  Natasha  as  a  grown-up. 

*'No,  no  indeed,  I'll  do  it  myself,  and  you  just  listen  at  the 
door."  And  Natasha  ran  across  the  drawing  room  into  the 
hall,  where  on  the  same  chair,  at  the  clavicord,  his  face  buried 
in  his  hands,  Denisov  was  sitting.  He  started  up  at  the 
sound  of  her  light  steps. 

"Natalie,"  he  said,  approaching  her  with  swift  steps.  "De- 
cide my  fate;  it  is  in  your  hands!" 

"Vasily  Dmitrich,  I'm  so  sorry  for  you!  No,  but  you're 
so  splendid  .  .  .  but  I  mustn't  .  .  .  this  .  .  .  and  so  I 
shall  always  love  you." 

Denisov  bent  over  her  hand,  and  she  heard  strange  sounds 
that  she  could  not  comprehend.  She  kissed  him  on  his  black, 
tousled,  curly  head.  At  that  moment  there  was  heard  the  hasty 
rustle  of  the  Countess's  gown.    She  came  up  to  them. 

"Vasily  Dmitrich,  I  thank  you  for  the  honor,"  said  the 
Countess  in  a  disturbed  voice,  but  one  that  seemed  severe 
to  Denisov;  "but  my  daughter  is  so  young,  and  I  thought  that 
you,  as  my  son's  friend,  would  apply  to  me  first.  In  such  a 
case  you  would  have  spared  me  the  necessity  of  a  refusal." 

"Countess,"  said  Denisov  with  lowered  eyes  and  a  guilty 
air;  he  endeavored  to  continue,  and  hesitated. 

Natasha  could  not  bear  to  see  him  in  such  a  pitiable  state. 
She  began  to  sob  loudly. 

"Countess,  I  am  at  fault,"  Denisov  continued  with  a  choking 
voice,  "but  be  assured  that  I  so  worship  your  daughter  and 
all  your  family  that  I  would  give  two  lives.  .  ."  He 
glanced  at  the  Countess  and  noticed  her  stern  face.  "Well, 
good-bye.  Countess,"  he  said,  kissing  her  hand;  and,  without 
a  glance  at  Natasha,  he  left  the  room  with  quick,  decisive 
steps. — [Part  iv,  ch.  16.] 


166  TOLSTOY 

More  than  three  years  have  passed,  and  a  state  ball 
is  given  by  a  St.  Petersburg  grandee  to  welcome  in 
the  new  year,  1810.  The  Rostov  family  prepare  anxiously 
for  the  great  occasion;  Tolstoy  lingers  with  delight,  in 
which  his  readers  share,  over  the  scene  in  the  dressing 
room,  which  shows  us  Natasha's  eager  care  that  her 
cousin  Sonya  and  her  mother  shall  look  their  best.  At 
the  ball  Prince  Audrey  Bolkonsky,  a  young  man  who 
has  some  time  before  lost  his  wife,  and  who  has  once 
caught  a  glimpse  of  Natasha  at  the  Rostovs'  country 
estate,  now  meets  her  once  more: 

Prince  Andr^y,  like  all  men  who  have  grown  up  in  society, 
liked  to  meet  in  society  something  not  marked  with  the  general 
social  stamp.  And  such  was  Natasha,  with  her  astonishment, 
joy,  and  timidity,  and  even  with  her  mistakes  in  French.  He 
behaved  and  spoke  to  her  with  peculiar  tenderness  and  care. 
Sitting  by  her  and  talking  with  her  about  the  simplest  and  most 
insignificant  topics.  Prince  Audrey  gazed  with  delight  at  the 
joyous  sparlde  of  her  eyes  and  at  her  smile,  which  was  caused 
not  by  anything  that  was  said  but  by  the  happiness  that  was 
within  her.  When  Natasha  was  chosen  as  a  partner  and  rose 
with  a  smile,  and  danced  through  the  hall,  Prince  Audrey 
admired  particularly  her  timid  grace.  In  the  middle  of  the 
cotillion  Natasha,  having  finished  a  figure,  came  back  to  her 
place,  still  panting.  A  new  partner  invited  her  once  more. 
She  rose,  still  out  of  breath,  and  evidently  thought  of  de- 
clining, but  immediately  merrily  raised  her  hand  once 
more  to  the  shoulder  of  her  partner  and  smiled  to  Prince 
Audrey. 

"I  should  have  been  glad  to  rest  and  sit  a  while  with  you, 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN'*   167 

for  I  was  tired;  but  you  see  they  keep  inviting  me,  and  I 
am  glad  of  it,  and  I  am  happy,  and  I  love  everybody,  and 
you  and  I  understand  all  that — "  this  and  much  more  be- 
sides was  expressed  in  her  smile.  When  her  partner  left  her, 
Natasha  ran  across  the  hall  to  select  two  ladies  for  the  figures. 

"If  she  goes  to  her  cousin  first  and  then  to  another  lady, 
then  she  will  be  my  wife,'*  Prince  Audrey  said  to  himself 
absolutely  unexpectedly  as  he  watched  her.  She  went  to  her 
cousin  first. 

"What  stuff  will  come  into  one's  head  sometimes!"  thought 
Prince  Audrey.  "But  this  much  is  certain,  that  that  girl 
is  so  charming,  so  different  from  everybody  else,  that  before 
she  has  danced  here  a  month  she  will  get  married.  She  is 
a  rarity  for  this  place,"  he  thought,  when  Natasha,  adjusting 
a  rose  that  had  got  out  of  place  in  her  corsage,  seated  herself 
beside  him. 

At  the  end  of  the  cotillion  the  old  Count  in  his  blue  dress 
coat  came  up  to  the  dancers.  He  invited  Prince  Audrey  to 
call  and  asked  his  daughter  whether  she  was  having  a  good 
time.  Natasha  did  not  answer;  she  only  smiled  with  a  smile 
that  said  reproachfully:    "How  can  you  ask  such  a  question?" 

"The  best  time  I  ever  had  in  my  life!"  she  said,  and  Prince 
Audrey  noticed  how  she  quickly  started  to  raise  her  thin  arms 
to  embrace  her  father  and  immediately  let  them  fall  once 
more.  Natasha  was  happier  than  she  had  ever  been  before  in 
her  life.  She  was  at  that  highest  pinnacle  of  happiness  when  a 
human. being  becomes  perfectly  good  and  kind  and  does  not 
believe  in  the  possibility  of  evil,  unhappiness,  and  grief. — 
[Part  VI,  ch.  17.] 

Prince  Andrey  makes  a  proposal  for  Natasha  in  due 
form.    She  accepts  him  and  falls  madly  in  love  wjtb 


168  TOLSTOY 

him,  as  well  she  may — for  no  young  man  in  Russia  is 
of  higher  character,  of  finer  talent,  or  of  more  brilliant 
Tsocial  position.  Owing  to  the  opposition  of  Prince 
Audrey's  father,  the  marriage  must  be  postponed  for  a 
year,  during  which  time  Prince  Audrey  travels  in  western 
Europe.  Natasha,  ill  at  ease  owing  to  the  separation 
from  him,  and  treated  with  rudeness  by  his  family, 
meets  the  rake  Anatole  Kuragin,  who  by  mere  masculine 
force  of  character  leads  astray  the  impressionable  young 
girl  and  persuades  her  to  elope  with  him.  Luckily 
the  shrewd  and  kindly  woman  at  whose  house  Natasha 
is  staying  learns  of  the  plot  and  averts  disaster  by  locking 
Natasha  securely  in  her  chamber.  Natasha,  disgraced, 
gradually  recovers  from  her  infatuation;  the  one  person 
who  gives  her  effective  comfort  and  sympathy  is  the 
slow,  fat-witted  Pierre  Bezukhov,  the  rich  husband  of 
a  bad  woman,  sister  of  Anatole  Kuragin.  Natasha, 
repentant,  prepares  for  communion,  and  at  the  solemn 
service  is  bidden  to  pray  for  those  who  hate  her.  The 
poor  child  can  think  of  none  who  do  so,  since  everybody 
whom  she  has  known  has  been  fond  of  her;  but,  after 
reflection,  she  prays  for  her  father's  creditors — who  need 
her  prayers — and  for  Anatole,  who  has  done  her  wrong, 
though  he  has  not  hated  her.  The  service  changes  to 
prayers  for  the  destruction  of  the  enemies  of  Russia. 
But  Natasha  "could  not  pray  for  the  trampUng  under 
foot  of  her  enemies,  when  a  few  moments  before  her 
only  wish  had  been  to  have  m.ore  of  them  in  order  to 
pray  for  them.    Yet  she  could  not  doubt  the  justice  of 


"WAR  AND  PEACE*'  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN'*   169 

the  prayer  repeated  by  the  kneeHng  throng."*  Prince 
Andrey,  bitter  and  cynical  owing  to  Natasha's  betrayal 
of  him,  is  brought  wounded  from  Borodino  into  Moscow, 
and  is  carried  from  the  doomed  city  by  the  Rostovs. 
Natasha  nurses  him  tenderly  until  his  death  and  wins 
his  forgiveness.  Later  the  wife  of  Pierre  dies  and  Pierre 
wins  Natasha.    The  epilogue  shows  them  living  happily: 

Natasha  had  married  in  the  early  spring  of  1813,  and  by  1820 
already  had  three  daughters  and  one  son,  whom  she  had  longed 
for  and  whom  she  was  now  suckling  herself.  She  had  grown 
stout  and  plump,  so  that  it  was  hard  to  recognize  in  this  strong 
mother  the  former  slender  and  hvely  Natasha.  Her  features 
had  become  defined  and  had  an  expression  of  calm  softness  and 
clearness.  In  her  face  there  was  no  longer  that  ceaselessly 
glowing  fire  of  animation  that  had  formed  her  charm.  Now 
often  only  her  face  and  body  were  visible,  and  her  soul  was  not 
visible  at  all.  There  was  visible  only  a  strong,  handsome,  and 
fertile  female.  Very  rarely  now  did  the  former  fire  blaze  up 
within  her.  That  happened  only  when,  as  now,  her  husband 
returned  from  absence,  when  a  child  was  recovering  from  an 
illness,  .  .  .  and  very  rarely  when  something  accidentally 
aroused  her  to  singing,  which  she  had  completely  abandoned 
after  her  marriage.  And  in  those  rare  moments  when  the 
former  fire  blazed  up  in  her  mature  handsome  body  she  was 
still  more  attractive  than  before 

Natasha  did  not  like  general  society,  but  so  much  the  more 

did  she  prize  the  society  of  her  own  kin,  of    the    Countess 

Marya,  of  her  brother,  her  mother,  and  Sonya.     She  prized 

the  society  of  those  people  among  whom,  disheveled  and  in 

♦Part  IX,  eh.  18. 


170  TOLSTOY 

her  dressing  gown,  she  could  emerge  from  the  nursery  with 
long  strides  and  with  a  joyous  face,  and  exhibit  a  diaper  with  a 
yellow  spot  instead  of  a  green  one,  and  hear  consoling  assur- 
ances that  the  child  was  now  far  better. — [EpUogtie:  part  i, 
ch.  10.] 

Let  us  listen  to  the  brilliant  Russian  critic  Merezhkov- 
sky,  as  he  moralizes  over  this  situation,  which  has  dis- 
concerted so  many  readers: 

Natasha  has  "no  words  of  her  own."  But,  like  those 
statues  which,  rising  aloft  in  the  sky  on  the  very  pinnacles 
of  immense  complicated  buildings,  reign  over  them,  complete 
them  and  crown  them,  the  picture  of  Natasha-the-mother, 
appearing  in  the  epilogue  of  War  and  Peace,  mutely  and  ele- 
mentally reigns  over  the  whole  boundless  epopee,  so  that  the 
action  of  a  tragedy  of  universally  historic  significance — 
wars,  movement  of  nations,  the  grandeur  and  the  doom  of 
heroes — seems  only  the  pedestal  of  this  Mother-Female,  who, 
triumphing,  exhibits  diapers  with  a  yellow  spot  instead  of  a 
green  one.  AusterUtz,  Borodin6,  the  conflagration  of  Moscow, 
Napoleon,  Alexander  the  Blessed  may  be  and  may  perish — 
all  shall  pass  away,  all  shall  be  forgotten,  shall  be  wiped  off 
the  tablets  of  universal  history  by  a  succeeding  wave,  like 
letters  written  on  the  sands  of  the  shore — but  never,  in  no 
civilization,  after  no  storms  of  universally  historic  significance 
shall  mothers  cease  to  rejoice  over  a  yellow  spot  on  diapers 
instead  of  a  green  one.  At  the  very  summit  of  his  production, 
one  of  the  mightiest  edifices  ever  erected  by  men,  the  creator 
of  War  and  Peace  unfurls  this  cynical  banner,  "diapers  with  a 
yellow  spot,"  as  the  guiding  banner  of  humanity. — [Tolstoy 
and  Dostoyevshjy  part  ii,  ch.  3.] 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"   171 

Such  is  our  last  glimpse  of  Natasha  in  War  and 
Peace.  But,  as  has  been  said,  Tolstoy  had  at  first 
planned  a  novel  on  the  Decembrists,  which  was  to  deal 
with  the  later  life  of  the  same  characters  that  appear  in 
War  and  Peace,  and  he  had  written  certain  fragments  of 
it.  In  one  of  these  we  see  Natasha  in  her  old  age.  Pierre 
has  joined  the  conspiracy  and  has  been  sent  to  Siberia, 
whither  Natasha  has  followed  him.  In  1856  they  are 
allowed  to  return  home — and  this  is  how  Tolstoy  describes 
Natasha  on  her  arrival  in  Moscow: 

Natalya  Nikoldyevna,  after  arranging  the  room,  adjusted 
her  collar  and  cuffs,  which  were  still  clean,  despite  the  journey, 
combed  her  hair,  and  sat  down  by  the  table.  Her  fine  dark 
eyes  were  fixed  on  some  point  in  the  distance;  she  gazed 
and  rested.  She  seemed  to  be  resting  not  merely  from  the  un- 
packing, not  merely  from  the  journey,  not  merely  from  her 
heavy  years — she  seemed  to  be  resting  from  her  whole  life, 
and  the  distance  into  which  she  gazed  and  in  which  there 
rose  before  her  living,  beloved  faces,  was  the  rest  for  which  she 
yearned.  Whether  it  was  the  supreme  act  of  love  that  she  had 
performed  for  her  husband,  or  the  love  that  she  had  lived 
through  for  her  children  when  they  were  small,  whether  it 
was  some  grievous  loss  or  some  peculiarity  of  her  character — no 
person  who  glanced  at  this  woman  could  fail  to  understand 
that  there  was  nothing  more  to  be  expected  of  her;  that  she 
had  long  since  spent  her  whole  self  in  life  and  that  nothing 
remained  of  her.  There  remained  something  fair  and  sad, 
worthy  of  reverence,  like  memories,  like  moonlight.  It  was 
impossible  to  imagine  her  otherwise  than  surrounded  with 
respect  and  with  all  the  comforts  of  life.    That  she  should 


172  TOLSTOY 

ever  be  hungry  and  eat  greedily,  that  she  should  wear  dirty 
linen,  that  she  should  stumble  or  forget  to  blow  her  nose — 
nothing  of  the  sort  could  happen  to  her.  It  was  physically 
impossible.  Why  it  was  so  I  know  not,  but  her  every  motion 
was  majesty,  grace,  love  for  all  those  who  had  the  privilege  of 
seeing  her. 

Sie  pflegen  und  weben 

Himmlische  Rosen  ins  irdische  Leben. 
She  knew  those  verses  and  loved  them,  but  she  was  not  guided 
by  them.  Her  whole  nature  was  an  expression  of  this  thought, 
her  whole  life  was  but  an  unconscious  plaiting  of  invisible 
roses  into  the  life  of  all  men  whom  she  met.  She  had  followed 
her  husband  to  Siberia  simply  because  she  loved  him;  she  did 
not  think  of  what  she  could  do  for  him,  but  involuntarily  she 
did  everything.  She  spread  his  bed,  she  packed  his  things, 
she  prepared  his  dinner  and  his  tea,  and,  above  all,  she  was 
always  where  he  was,  and  greater  happiness  no  woman  could 
have  given  to  her  husband. — [The  Decembrists,  fragment  I, 
eh.  1.] 

The  same  immediate  touch  with  life,  the  same  frank 
directness,  are  found  in  Natasha's  prosaic  brother 
Nikolay,  who,  devoid  of  any  personal  charm,  inde- 
pendence of  character,  or  magnetism,  develops,  after 
sowing  a  patch  or  two  of  wild  oats,  into  a  typical  country 
squire.  He  is  the  central  figure  in  Tolstoy's  marvelous 
vdescription  of  the  wolf  hunt,  the  finest  picture  of  out- 
of-door  sport  to  be  found  in  Russian  literature.  The 
feeling  in  the  scene  is  that  of  Borrow's  Petulengro: 
"There's  the  wind  on  the  heath,  brother;  if  I  could 
only  feel  that,  I  would  gladly  live  forever."    NikoMy's 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN'*   17S 

whole  being  is  absorbed  in  the  tense  excitement  of  the 
moment: 

Several  Jiroes  be  addressed  a  prayer  to  God  that  the  wolf 
might  come. out  towards  him;  he  prayed  with  that  passionate 
and  shamefaced  feeling  with  which  men  pray  in  moments  of 
strong  agitation  that  depends  on  an  insignificant  cause. 
"What  does  it  cost  Thee,"  he  said  to  God,  "to  do  this  for  me! 
I  know  that  Thou  art  great,  and  that  it  is  a  sin  to  ask  Thee 
for  this;  but  for  God's  sake  make  the  old  wolf  come  out 
towards  me,  and  make  Karay  clutch  him  with  a  death  grip  in 
the  throat."— [Part  vii,  eh.  5.] 

Very  different  from  Natasha  and  Nikola^is^qnya,  a 
distant  relative  and  dependent  of  the  Rostov  family. 
She  is  good  and  sweet,  but  she  has  no  bubbhng  spring"^ 
of  life  within  her.  Loving  Nikolay  with  a  constant 
devotion,  she  wins  his  heart;  then,  seeing  that  he  has  no 
ardent  affection  for  her,  and  that  he  must  make  a 
rich  match,  she  gives  him  up.  Nikolay  retrieves  the 
family  fortunes  by  marrying  the  wealthy  Princess 
Marya  Bolkonsky,  sister  of  Prince  Audrey,  and  Sonya 
lives  on  as  a  dependent  in  their  family.  "Sometimes  I 
am  awfully  sorry  for  her,"  Natasha  comments.  "I 
used  to  be  awfully  anxious  that  Nikolay  should  marry 
her;  but  I  always  seemed  to  have  a  premonition  that 
it  could  never  happen.  She  is  a  sterile  flower;  such  as 
grow  on  strawberry  vines,  you  know.  Sometimes  I  am 
sorry  for  her,  and  sometimes  I  think  that  she  does  not 
feel  it  as  we  should."* 

*  Epilogue;  part  i,  ch.  8. 


174  TOLSTOY 

Wonderful  in  another  fashion  is  the  account  of  the 
home  Hfe  of  old  Prince  Bolkonsky,  formerly  a  general 
in  the  Russian  army.  A  widowed  recluse,  he  passes  his 
time  alone  on  his  estate,  working  at  his  turning  lathe, 
making  mathematical  calculations,  and  giving  lessons 
in  geometry  to  his  daughter  Marya.  The  old  humorist 
is  a  real  figure,  not  a  grotesque  exaggeration. 

The  Kuragin  family  show  Tolstoy's  skill  in  still  a 
different  sphere.  Occupying  a  high  station  in  court 
society,  they  are  all  corrupt  and  vicious.  The  father 
is  a  selfish  schemer,  with  no  heart  whatever,  and  capable 
of  the  dirtiest  intrigues.  The  sons  are  rakes;  the 
daughter,  the  statuesque  Princess  Elena,  who  married 
Pierre  Bezukhov,  is  every  whit  as  stupid  and  as  wicked 
as  they,  but  by  her  physical  beauty  and  by  a  certain 
native  tact  she  holds  a  secure  position  as  a  society 
queen.  As  to  her  Tolstoy  preaches  no  sermons;  by 
hints  and  suggestions  he  conveys  his  loathing  for  her 
sensual  nature. 

In  War  and  Peace  Tolstoy's  methods  are  the  same 
that  have  been  already  analyzed  in  speaking  of  Child- 
hoody  Boyhood,  and  Youth.  But  he  uses  them  with  a 
bolder  sweep;  his  tone  of  cynical  probing  into  motives 
^is  replaced  by  that  of  joyous,  unconscious,  benevolent 
/  omniscience.  He  first  describes  the  outward  appearance 
of  a  man  or  woman  in  such  a  way  as  to  suggest  char- 
acter; then  he  gradually  unfolds  that  character  by  acts, 
great  and  small,  and  by  detailed  analysis  of  the  feel- 
ings.    Each  person  grows  old  before  the  reader's  eyes. 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"   175 

Similarly,  Tolstoy's  pictures  of  battles  and  of  war  in 
general  show  the  same  peculiarities  that  we  have  already  ._ 
reinaxked  in  Sevastojpql.  Suffering,  not  heroism,  gives 
war,  its  individuality.  The  showy  heroism  of  Prince 
Audrey  at  Austerlitz  accomplishes  nothing;  Nikolay's 
tales  of  hussar  bravery  are  mainly  folly  and  pretence. 
The  real  actors  in  battle  are  the  quiet  common  soldiers, 
or  men  like  the  modest  artillery  captain  Tushin.  But 
now  Tolstoy  proceeds  from  mere  observation  of  the 
details  of  military  life,  as  masterly  as  that  which  he 
gives  of  the  drawing  room  and  the  nursery,  to  a  reasoned 
commentary  on  war,  of  which  the  finality  is  not  so  ap- 
parent. Not  only  valorous  officers,  he  argues,  but  clever 
generals  are  of  no  account  in  the  progress  of  a  campaign. 
Napoleon,  greatest  of  military  geniuses  by  common  "^ 
repute,  was  nothing  but  a  puffed-up  nonentity.  Cir- 
cumstances favored  him  in  his  early  campaigns,  and  he 
won  them;  in  his  invasion  of  Russia  he  showed  neither 
more  nor  less  military  talent  than  before,  yet  he  was 
miserably  defeated,  since  the  trend  of  events — one  may 
call  this  fate,  though  Tolstoy  avoids  the  term— was  now 
against  him.  Analyzing  Napoleon's  single  acts  in  the 
war,  Tolstoy  shows  them  to  have  been  foolish  and  ill-  V 
judged.  The  Russian  generals  who  contrived  strategy 
to  meet  Napoleon  were  similarly  impotent.  Only 
Kutuzov,  fat  and  sluggish,  almost  in  his  dotage,  wh(>^-;'' 
sleeps  through  a  council  of  war,  is  master  of  the  situa- 
tion by  surrendering  himself  to  the  spontaneous  move- 
ment  of  the  Russian  people  and  swimming  with  the 


176  TOLSTOY 

current.    Napoleon  was  defeated  by  a  whole  nation  of 
which  Kutuzov  was  the  accidental  representative. 

In  all  this  one  sees  the  individualism  .nd  hatred  of 
organization  that  is  a  distinguishing  trait  of  Tolstoy's 
temperament.  He  can  draw  the  whole  man  in  the  case 
of  Nikolay  Rostov  or  Pierre  Bezukhov  or  Levin  (in 
Anna  Karenin);  he  can  show  the  officer  in  the  mess 
room  or  the  dreamer  in  his  study,  even  the  capable 
proprietor  superintending  laborers  on  his  estate.  But 
more  complicated  organization,  in  which  one  must  per- 
force rise  beyond  human  relations  into  something  like 
statistical  calculations,  and  in  which  one  deals  with  ink 
and  paper  as  well  as  human  beings,  or  instead  of  them, 
is  uncongenial  to  Tolstoy,  and  he  disbelieves  in  talent 
so  exhibited.  Napoleon  is  futile,  but  so  also  is  Speransky, 
the  great  Liberal  minister  of  Alexander  I,  whose  plan 
for  the  transformation  of  Russia  into  a  constitutional 
V  monarchy  was  thwarted,  though  Tolstoy  does  not  tell  us 
so,  by  the  treachery  of  his  master.  A  man'sjtrue  mission 
is  to  shape  his  own  life;  when  he  attempts  to  guide 
external  events  he  becomes  ineffective. 

One  is  not  surprised  then,  to  find  War  and  Peace 
widely  different  in  artistic  methods  from  all  historical 
novels  of  the  school  of  Sir  Walter  Scott,  Dumas,  or 
Sienkiewicz.  Ivanhoe  and  The  Talisman  give  pictures  of 
far-off  times  and  countries  that  add  to  the  narrative 
a  gaudy  strangeness;  costuming  and  historic  associa- 
tions lend  interest  to  conventional  and  vaguely  con- 
ceived characters;   Tolstoy,  on  the  other  hand,  draws 


(/ 


**WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KAEENIN"   177 

living  men  and  women  whose  lives  are  seen  against 
the  background  of  a  world  event  which  they  have  no 
power  to  shape  or  direct.  In  Scott's  stories  historical 
persons  like  Richard  the  Lion-hearted  and  Saladin 
mingle  with  the  creations  of  the  novelist's  fancy  and 
determine  their  fortunes,  or  are  potently  aided  by  them; 
underneath  the  story  lies  the  tacit  assumption  that 
the  individual  will  is  the  force  determining  history. 
History  becomes  a  complex  of  picturesque  biographies. 
In  War  and  Peace  Napoleon  appears,  but  as  an  awkward, 
stoutish  man,  vain  and  futile,  who  has  no  more  influence 
on  history  than  the  meanest  soldier  in  the  army  that 
invades  Russia  under  his  nominal  leadership.  The 
Rostovs  and  Bolkonskys  are  affected  not  by  Napoleon 
or  Alexander,  but  by  the  unseen,  mysterious  currents  of 
human  destiny. 

This  conception  of  history  Tolstoy  does  not  leave 
to  be  inferred  from  his  narrative,  nor  does  he  convey  it 
by  scattered  hints  and  comments;  to  it  he  devotes  whole 
chapters  of  abstract  reasoning.  These  are,  one  must 
admit,  a  blemish  in  his  great  work,  of  which  they  inter- 
rupt the  continuity.  The  theory  that  they  develop  is 
of  no  importance  except  as  coming  from  Tolstoy,  as  one 
stage  in  the  thought  of  a  man  of  vigorous,  though  ec- 
centric, intellectual  power.  In  the  narrative  his  skill 
as  an  artist  makes  us  accept  for  the  moment  his  view 
of  the  impotence  of  human  individuals  in  the  shaping  of 
history,  just  as  the  skill  of  Homer  makes  us  accept  the 
contrarj;^  assumption  of  the  all-importance  of  personal 


\^ 


178  TOLSTOY 

prowess.  An  artist  need  see  but  one  side  of  a  question, 
a  philosopher  must  see  all  sides;  when  Tolstoy  philos- 
ophizes he  stijl  sees  but  one  side,  and  the  flaws  in  his 
reasoning  become  apparent.  When  inspired  by  moral 
fervor,  as  in  the  religious  works  of  his  later  life,  or  when 
he  discusses  problems  of  human  life  drawn  from  his 
own  experience,  as  in  his  articles  on  education,  Tolstoy 
is  a  writer  of  marvelous  power;  when,  as  here,  he  tries 
to  analyze  an  abstract  problem,  he  is  confused,  contra- 
dictory, and  tiresome. 

History,  Tolstoy  states,  has  been  conceived  of  as 
primarily  the  work  of  heroes,  of  representative  men,  of 
leaders  who  have  consciously  shaped  human  destiny. 
To  this  conception  of  history,  antiquated  even  in  his 
own  time,  Tolstoy  correctly  demurs,  but  he  errs  by 
running  to  the  other  extreme,  and  totally  denying  the 
part  played  by  the  individual  not  only  in  guiding  the 
fate  of  a  nation,  but  in  directing  the  course  of  a  cam- 
paign, or  deciding  the  outcome  of  a  single  battle.  In 
a  battle,  he  argues,  no  general  knows  what  is  happening; 
even  subordinate  commanders,  not  to  speak  of  the  field 
marshal,  fail  to  control  the  men  beneath  them.  A 
battle  depends  on  a  number  of  factors  so  infinitely 
large  as  to  transcend  human  intellect.  Seeing  that  a 
general  is  not  omniscient  and  omnipresent,  Tolstoy 
jumps  to  the  conclusion  that  he  is  powerless.  He 
forgets  his  preparations  for  the  battle,  his  massing  of 
chosen  troops,  his  wise  selection  of  subordinates,  his 
personal  influence  on  the  mind  of  every  private  in  his 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  *'ANNA  KxiRENIN"17d 

ranks.  Napoleon,  Tolstoy  tells  us,  did  not  order  the 
invasion  of  Russia  any  more  than  each  of  his  private 
soldiers  did  so,  for  if  one  corporal  had  refused  to  enter 
the  new  campaign,  and  others  had  followed  his  example, 
then  the  invasion  could  not  have  taken  place.* 

The  soldiers  of  the  French  army  advanced  to  kill  and  to  be 
killed  at  the  battle  of  Borodin5  not  in  consequence  of  thQ 
command  of  Napoleon,  but  by  their  own  desire.  The  wholc^ 
army,  French,  Italians,  Germans,  Poles,  hungry,  tattered^ 
and  worn  out  by  the  march,  in  the  sight  of  an  army  that^ 
barred  them  from  Moscow,  felt  that  U  vin  est  tire  et  qu'il 
faut  le  boire.  If  Napoleon  had  now  forbidden  them  to  fight 
with  the  Russians,  they  would  have  killed  him  and  gone  on  t( 
fight  with  the  Russians,  because  it  was  indispensable  foi 
them  to  do  so. — [Part  x,  ch.  28.1 

These  arguments  are  hardly  worthy  of  the  detailed 

refutation  that  General  Dragomirov  has  bestowed  on 

them.f  and  indeed  Tolstoy  himself  is  not  always  true 

to  them.    He  tells,  for  example,  how  Kutuzov  "followed 

that  impalpable  force  which  is  called  the  spirit  of  an 

army,"  and  on  which  victory  depends,  and  how  "he 

guided  it  so  far  as  that  was  in  his  power; "J  and  to 

guide  the  spirit  of  an  army  is  surely  much  the  same 

thing  as  to  guide  the  army  itself.     To  say  nothing  of 

such  minor  departures  from  his  own  principles,  Tolstoy's 

minimizing  of  the  importance  of  leaders  of  men  is  of 

*  Part  IX,  ch.  1. 

t  Tolstoy's  "  War  and  Peace  "from  a  Military  Point  of  View.  Included 
in  volume  of  Sketches:  Kiev,  1898. 
t  Part  X,  ch.  35. 


180  TOLSTOY 

two  sorts,  radically  inconsistent  with  each  other.  On 
I  the  one  hand  he  makes  Napoleon  of  no  more  significance 
than  a  private  soldier  in  his  army;  on  the  other  he 
i  makes  him  a  blind  instrument  in  the  hands  of  the  forces 
controlling  human  destiny,  thereby  recognizing  that  at 
least  he  was  a  more  important  instrument  than  any 
other  man  of  his  time.  This  fundamental  contradiction 
runs  through  all  his  reasoning  on  the  part  played  by 
the  individual  in  history. 

History,  Tolstoy  maintains,  is  the  work  of  all  men, 
\  and  the  result  of  an  inscrutable  number  of  minute  causes. 

No  man  by  conscious  effort  can  alter  history,  which  is 
the  result  of  unconscious  human  activity.  (One  queries 
what  Tolstoy  would  say  of  the  Trans-Siberian  Rail- 
road or  the  Panama  Canal.)  Its  laws  are  then  beyond 
the  reach  of  human  reason;  events  happened  simply 
because  they  were  bound  to  do  so.  In  his  revolt  from 
hero-worship  Tolstoy  reaches  only  blind  fatalism,  with 
no  glimmer  of  the  modern  economic  interpretation  of 
history. 

In  fact  the  economic  interpretation  of  history  con- 
tradicts two  of  Tolstoy's  fundamental  ideas,  those  of 
j\th.e  fixity  and  the  duality  of  human  nature.  "Life  mean- 
while," Tolstoy  writes  after  mentioning  the  events  of 
the  years  1808  and  1809,  "the  genuine  life  of  men  with 
its  essential  interests  of  health,  disease,  work,  rest; 
with  its  interests  of  thought,  science,  poetry,  music, 
love,  friendship,  hatred,  passions,  went  on  as  always 
independently  and  aloof  from  political  intimacy  and 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"   181 

enmity  with  Napoleon  Bonaparte,  and  aloof  from  all 
possible  transformations."*  Here  he  fails  to  recognize 
the  fundamental  sociological  truth,  that  "personal 
life  is  conditioned  by  certain  social  forms,  which  change 
in  consequence  of  the  historical  process;  and  that  on 
these  forms,  on  the  whole  complexion  of  social  life, 
depend  the  fullness,  the  freedom,  and  the  prosperity 
of  personal  existence."t  ^^  ^^is  transformation  of 
human  character  by  historic  conditions  rests  the  whole 
modern  conception  of  history. 

Furthermore  Tolstoy  makes  a  strict  distinction  be- 
tween the  personal  and  the  pubHc  life  of  man: 

^.  There  are  two  sides  of  life  in  every  man:  the  personal  life, 
which  is  the  more  free  the  more  abstract  are  its  interests; 
and  the  elemental,  swarm  life,  in  which  man  inevitably  fulfils 
laws  prescribed  to  him. 

Man  lives  consciously  for  himself,  but  serves  as  the  uncon- 
scious tool  for  the  attainment  of  the  historic  aims  of  all  human- 
ity. An  act  once  performed  is  irrevocable,  and  its  action, 
coinciding  in  time  with  millions  of  acts  of  other  men,  receives 
historic  significance.  The  higher  a  man  stands  on  the  social 
ladder,  and  the  more  people  there  are  with  whom  he  is  con- 
nected, the  more  power  does  he  have  over  other  people  and 
the  more  evident  are  the  predestined  character  and  the  in- 
evitability of  his  every  act. 

"The  king's  heart  is  in  the  hand  of  the  Lord."  [Proverbs 
xxi,   1.1 

*  Part  VI,  ch.  1. 

t  Kareyev:  The  Historical  Philosophy  of  Tolstoy  in  War  and  Peace 
(St.  Petersburg,  1888),  p.  8. 


182  TOLSTOY 

The  king  is  the  slave  of  history. 

History,  that  is  the  unconscious,  general,  swarm  life  of 
humanity,  makes  use  of  every  moment  of  the  life  of  kings  for 
itself,  as  a  tool  for  its  own  ends. — [Part  ix,  ch.  1.] 

In  the  personal  life  Tolstoy  feels  free  will,  and  takes  it 
for  granted;  in  the  "swarm  life"  he  denies  free  will  and 
devotes  many  pages  of  ingenious  reasoning  to  the  dis- 
proof of  its  existence.  His  discussion  of  the  problem 
suffers  from  a  confusion  of  two  distinct  questions: 
the  will  may  be  termed  bound  by  the  law  of  causality, 
no  act  taking  place  without  adequate  cause;  or  it  may 
be  thought  of  as  subject  to  the  operation  of  certain 
historic  laws,  quite  external  to  the  individual.  The 
first  question  is  one  for  metaphysicians  to  settle,  or  at 
least  to  discuss,  and  is  of  small  consequence  in  practical 
life;  but  one  thing  is  self-evident,  that  if  the  law  of 
causality  applies  to  the  "swarm  life"  of  man  it  applies 
equally  well  to  the  life  of  the  individual  souk  And  proof 
that  the  will  is  bound  in  the  first  sense  does  not  in  the 
least  imply  that  it  is  bound  in  the  second  sense;  much 
less  that,  if  so  bound,  it  could  escape  bondage  by  fleeing 
from  the  "swarm  life"  into  that  of  the  individual  soul. 
Tolstoy's  reasoning  is  once  more  an  expression  of  his 
dislike  for  public  activity,  of  the  same  bias  that  in  his 
articles  on  education  had  made  him  recognize  progress  in 
the  soul  of  man  and  deny  it  in  history.  His  conscious- 
ness, which  proclaims  freedom  as  the  condition  of  life, 
is  at  war  with  his  intellect,  which  views  every  act  of 
man  as  predetermined;    this  dualistic  view  of  human 


*'WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  *'ANNA  KARENIN"183 

nature  is  his  refuge.  But  this  dualism  lacks  any  philo- 
sophic justification,  and  is  inconsistent  with  the  economic 
interpretation  of  history,  which  would  regard  the  efforts 
of  certain  persons  (hermits  or  monks,  for  example)  to 
withdraw  from  the  public  life  of  the  world,  as  itself 
an  historic  phenomenon  of  considerable  importance. 

This  brief  summary  of  Tolstoy's  views  in  War  and 
Peace  shows  his  total  lack  of  real  historic  interest.  His 
definition  of  historic  science  is  a  mere  negation  of  the 
possibility  of  such  a  science.  Wrapt  up  in  the  problems  of 
the  individual  life,  Tolstoy  condemns  any  attempt  of  the 
individual  to  influence  history.  As  a  novelist  and  an 
historian,  he  is  a  realist,  drawing  individual  human  life 
as  it  is,  and  striving  to  represent  the  historic  process 
in  the  same  fashion.  But  in  the  first  case  he  is  likewise 
an  idealist,  presenting  character  not  only  as  it  is,  but 
in  relation  to  what  it  should  be;  his  characters  are  ^  , 
ceaselessly  aspiring  and  ever  occupied  with  moral  prob-'^s;' 
lems.  This  strain  of  idealism  pervades  all  the  greatest 
Russian  writers,  and  distinguishes  them  from  the 
French  Naturalists;  it  is  peculiarly  characteristic  of 
Tolstoy.  Yet  in  his  reasoning  on  history,  thanks  to  his 
fatalistic  conception  of  it,  his  idealism  deserts  him;  men 
cannot  guide  humanity  forward  by  conscious  effort. 
Later,  in  What  Shall  We  Do  Then?  (1886),  Tolstoy  will 
open  his  eyes  and  see  that  any  individual,  by  developing 
a  new  life  conception,  may  by  infection  modify  the 
lives  of  others,  and  so  be  an  instrument  for  bringing 
in  a  new  social  order.    Then  he  will  construct  his  own 


184  TOLSTOY 

theory  of  historic  progress,  which  will  differ  from  that 
of  the  Liberals  not  in  kind  but  aim.  And  then,  in  Why 
People  Become  Intoxicated  (1890),  he  will  condemn  dis- 
cussion on  free  will  and  determinism  as  a  futile  waste 
of  time. 

Unlike  his  views  on  history,  Tolstoy's  views  on  per- 
sonal conduct  are  expressed  not  in  chapters  of  abstract 
reasoning,  but  through  the  figures  of  Audrey  Bolkonsky, 
Pierre  Bezukhov,  and  Platon  Karatayev.  To  the  first 
two  of  these  men,  the  chief  heroes  of  the  novel,  he 
gives  what  he  terms  the  finest  human  qualities  (those 
which  are  always  denied  to  generals);  love,  poetry, 
tenderness,  and  searching  philosophic  doubt.*  The 
third,  a  humble  peasant,  proves  to  represent  the  moral 
ideal  for  which  the  high-born  Pierre  has  been  vainly 
seeking.  In  each  we  see  Tolstoy's  emphasis  on  moral 
personality,  as  opposed  to  historic  activity. 

Prince  Audrey  Bolkonsky  is  perhaps  the  most  suc- 
cessfully portrayed  "good  man"  in  all  fiction.  Most 
heroes  of  poetry  and  romance  that  are  meant  to  be 
types  of  strong,  eflScient  character,  Achilles,  Prince 
Hal,  Quentin  Durward,  are  mere  ardent,  vigorous  boys, 
whose  charm  is  in  youthful  energy,  and  who  must  either 
die  young  or  grow  into  portly  and  uninteresting  middle- 
age.  The  middle-aged  hero  is  usually  a  good  man  with 
a  weakness  or  a  villain  with  certain  high  endowments, 
Don  Quixote  or  Colonel  Newcome  or  Macbeth;  his 
destiny  is  tragic  and  he  appeals  to  our  compassion  quite 

*  Part  IX,  ch.  U-l 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN**   185 

as  much  as  to  our  admiration.  The  perfect  man,  effi- 
cient in  intellect,  virtuous  in  conduct,  and  successful 
in  his  career,  is  generally  a  prig  or  a  bore:  pious  JEneas 
is  the  best  example  for  all  time,  while  the  mythical 
George  Washington  of  the  popular  imagination  may  be 
a  fair  second.  (Tolstoy's  Levin,  as  we  shall  see,  knocks 
for  admittance  to  this  mawkish  club,  but  is  not  quite 
permitted  to  enter.)  Poets  and  novelists  of  genius  have 
understood  ardent  young  men;  they  have  also  a  sym- 
pathy with  the  human  side  of  usurpers,  generals,  and 
statesmen.  But  to  expect  that  they  should  understand 
the  technical,  special  endowments  of  a  statesman  or  a 
general  or  a  captain  of  industry,  of  a  Speransky  or  a 
Napoleon,  is  as  absurd  as  to  demand  that  they  make 
independent  contributions  to  chemistry  or  botany. 
And  yet  it  is  just  this  technical  side  of  a  statesman  or 
a  general  that  counts  in  his  dealings  with  men,  while 
the  technical  endowments  of  a  chemist  or  a  botanist  may 
never  be  guessed  by  men  other  than  chemists  or  botanists. 
Virgil  cannot  make  us  see  the  generalship  or  the  states- 
manship of  iEneas  and  he  is  forced  to  pour  out  such 
fulsome  admiration  of  the  man  as  defeats  its  own  aim. 
Shakespeare  or  Congreve  can  make  a  simple  maiden  or 
a  society  belle  charming  by  their  conversation;  they 
cannot  similarly  create  a  leader  of  men.  Shakespeare 
can  write  an  eloquent  speech  for  Mark  Antony,  or  he 
can  tell  us  of  the  great  side  of  a  character  like  Brutus  and 
make  the  man  winning  by  his  simple  humanity:  that 
is  all. 


186  TOLSTOY 

To  return  from  this  long  digression,  in  Prince  Andr6y 
Tolstoy  has  come  nearer  than  any  other  novelist  to  solv- 
ing this  impossible  problem.    To  this  character  he  has 
given  his  own  energy  and  vigor,  along  with  a  con- 
ventional society  distinction  and  charm  of  which  he 
felt  the  lack  in  himself.     He  has  made  him  conscientious, 
high-spirited,  self-sacrificing,  with  lofty  aims.     Prince 
Audrey  is  an  aristocrat  by  nature  as  well  as  by  birth; 
his  talents  are  recognized  by  all,  and  the  path  to  dis- 
tinction in  the  state  service  lies  open  to  him.     To  say 
all  this  of  a  man  is  easy,  but  Tolstoy  manages  to  have 
Andrey's  manner  and  words  suggest  his  distinction. 
He  is  efiicient,  not  oratorical;    his  personal  courage  is 
that  of  a  man  rather  than  of  a  valiant  boy  such  as 
Nikolay.     By  his  human  failings  of  pride  and  uncharity, 
even  snobbery,  Tolstoy  preserves  him  from  being  mawk- 
ish.   Then    comes  the    characteristically    Russian,   or 
shall  we  say  Tolstoy  an  touch.     Prince  Audrey  suddenly 
finds  meaningless  all  the  public  activity  that  has  seemed 
to  him  so  important;  he  looks  forward  to  true  happiness 
in  Hfe  with  Natasha.     Deserted  by  her,  he  is  filled  with 
cynicism  and  despair;  then,  mortally  wounded  at  Boro- 
dino, he  recovers  happiness  in  the  hospital,  by  forgiving 
Anatole  Kuragin,  the  man  who  has  wronged  him,  and 
who  now  lies  on  the  operating  table  near  by.     Tolstoy 
has  created  a  man  fit  for  action,  but  has  made  him  see 
the  futility  of  the  active  life  just  as  he  is  winning  his 
y  first  success  in  it,  in  order  that  he  may  take  up  the 
true  life  of  thought  and  feeling. 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"   187 

Thought  and  feeling  have  ever  been  the  portion  of 
Prince  Andrey's  friend  and  complement,  Count  Pierre 
Bezukhov.  He  is  a  stout,  short-sighted,  ungainly  youth, 
possessed  of  immense  wealth.  Incapable  of  making  a 
good  impression  in  society  and  not  above  reproach  in 
his  private  life,  he  is  valued  by  Audrey  because  of  his 
transparent  goodness  of  heart.  Tricked  into  marriage 
with  an  evil  woman,  he  finds  solace  in  the  mystic  mum- 
meries of  the  Free  Masons.  For  a  time  these  give  a 
moral  stimulus  to  his  dreamy  nature,  but  he  soon  dis- 
covers that  his  beloved  order  is  becoming  a  refuge  for 
fashionable  hypocrites.  His  love  and  pity  for  Natasha 
give  the  girl  hope  and  courage  when  most  she  needs 
them.  When  Napoleon  enters  Moscow,  Pierre  fantasti- 
cally imagines  himseK  the  savior  of  Russia  and  sets 
out  to  slay  the  conqueror.  He  is  forthwith  arrested 
by  the  French,  who  carry  him  off  on  their  retreat 
from  the  city.  On  the  dreadful  march  he  becomes 
acquainted  with  a  companion  in  captivity,  Platon 
Karatayev,  whose  words  and  example  work  a  moral 
transforma,tion  within  him.  When  released  from  duress, 
he  returns  to  his  estate,  marries  Natasha,  and  lives 
in  bliss  with  her,  under  her  welcome  yoke;  yet  his 
guiding  principle  in  life  is  always  the  memory  of 
Karatayev. 

And  who  was  Karatayev  .f*  An  illiterate  little  peasant, 
of  scanty  intelligence,  who  Hved  from  day  to  day  with 
no  thought  of  the  morrow.  He  was  incarnate  simpHcity 
and  goodness;  unable  to  reason  as  to  his  own  conduct. 


¥ 


188  TOLSTOY 

he   always   instinctively  fulfilled   the   spirit  of   Chris- 
tianity: 

Karatayev  had  no  attachments,  no  friendship  or  love,  as 
Pierre  understood  them;  but  he  loved  all  and  lived  lovingly 
with  all  with  which  hfe  brought  him  into  contact,  and  in 
particular  with  man — not  with  any  special  man,  but  with  the 
men  who  were  before  his  eyes.  He  loved  his  dog,  he  loved 
his  comrades,  loved  the  French,  loved  Pierre,  who  was  his 
neighbor;  but  Pierre  felt  that  Karatayev,  notwithstanding  all 
his  caressing  tenderness  towards  him  (by  which  he  involunta- 
rily paid  what  was  due  to  the  spiritual  life  of  Pierre),  would 
not  for  a  moment  have  been  grieved  by  separation  from  him. 
And  Pierre  began  to  experience  the  same  feeling  towards 
Karatayev. 

Plat6n  Karatayev  for  all  the  rest  of  the  prisoners  was  the 
most  ordinary  sort  of  soldier;  .  .  .  they  bantered  him  good- 
humoredly  and  sent  him  on  errands.  But  for  Pierre,  even  as 
he  had  appeared  on  that  first  night,  the  unattainable,  round, 
and  eternal  embodiment  of  the  spirit  of  simplicity  and  truth, 
so  he  remained  forever. — [Part  xii,  ch.  13.] 

This  simple  model  is  now  the  culmination  of  Tol- 

,  stoy's  wisdom:   absolute  submission  to  the  powers  that 

/   be,  absolute  refusal  to  enforce  one's  will  on  a  fellow 

/  creature,  absolute  truthfulness,  and,  above  all,  universal 

kindliness  and  love.     In  the  all-loving  self-effacement  of 

Karatayev,  and  in  the  maternal  love  of  Natasha,  the 

great  epic  narrative  of  Russia,  the  greatest  work  of  art 

-  that  has  come  from  the  broad  plains  of  eastern  Europe, 

finds  its  conclusion,  so  incongruous  from  the  point  of 


"WAR  AND  PEACE**  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN'*   189 

view  of  conventional  story-telling,  so  harmonious  with 
the  spirit  of  Tolstoy,  in  whose  eyes  the  founding  of  an 
empire  is  of  less  profit  to  a  man  than  a  single  act  of 
personal  kindness. 

As  has  already  been  emphasized,  there  are  two  sides 
to  Tolstoy's  nature  and  to  his  literary  genius.  He  has 
a  marvelous  power  over  concrete  detail,  the  pomp  and 
parade  of  external  circumstance,  and  he  uses  it  to  por- 
tray character  as  no  other  writer  has  ever  done.  On 
the  other  hand,  he  h^s  an  overmastering  sense  of  moral  ^ 
responsibility,  a  compelling  interest  in  the  inner  moral 
life.  In  the  works  written  before  his  marriage  the  first 
element  j)redominates;  in  War  and  Peace  it  still  holds 
the  first  place  in  the  reader's  attention,  despite  the 
prominence  that  is  given  to  the  moral  development  of 
Prince  Andrey  and  Pierre  Bezukhov.  In  Anna  Karenin 
the  moral  point  of  view  has  become  firmer  and  more 
dominating.  The  grip  on  externals  is  the  same,  but 
the  wealth  of  them  is  held  in  check  and  directed  to  a 
definite  end.  The  book,  whether  through  conscious  ob- 
servation of  technical  rules  of  construction,  or  uncon- 
scious following  of  a  moral  purpose,  has  a  unity  lacking 
in  its  predecessor,  and,  outside  of  Russia  at  least,  has 
gained  far  wider  circulation  and  greater  fame.  Its 
.Puritan  definiteness  of  moral  outlook  has  probably 
greatly  contributed  to  its  wonderful  success  in  England 
and  America. 

In  Anna  Karenin  Tolstoy  narrows  his  field,  concen- 


/ 


190  TOLSTOY 

trating  his  attention  on  two  families  and  on  their  private 
life.  Like  War  and  Peace,  this  new  novel  is  a  hymn  in 
praise  of  the  family.  "  The  idea  of  Anna  Karenin  is  that 
sexual  relations  must  be  guided  by  pure  Christian  love 
and  not  by  the  egoistic  love  of  aflBnity  or  by  the  ob- 
ligatory love  of  church  or  society.  Hence  he  takes  two 
pairs  of  lovers.  He  endows  the  first  pair,  Anna  and 
Vronsky,  with  more  perfections  than  the  second,  and 
shows  how  permanent  thought  and  fear  about  personal 
^happiness  ruin  their  lives,  and  how  sacrifice,  pardon,  and 
/ythe  desire  to  make  happy  another  (in  short  Christian 
\  love)  teach  Kitty  and  Levin  to  be  happy."  * 

Concentration  of  purpose  then  makes  Anna  Karenin 
the  most  unified  of  all  Tolstoy's  longer  works.  Further- 
more, in  the  construction  of  his  plot  Tolstoy  employs 
a  conventional  device  such  as  he  ordinarily  disdains 
and  such  as  we  might  anticipate  from  Sir  Walter  Scott 
or  from  Dickens.  At  the  time  when  Anna  meets 
Vronsky  for  the  first  time,  in  the  railway  station,  a 
peasant  is  killed  by  a  train.  Anna,  not  knowing  why, 
sees  in  the  incident  an  omen  foreboding  disaster,  and 
cannot  drive  it  from  her  mind.  Later,  during  the  course 
of  her  amour  with  Vronsky,  she  dreams  of  a  peasant 
bending  down  over  a  sack,  fumbling  in  it,  and  uttering 
incoherent  French  words:  Ilfaut  le  hatire  lefer,  le  broyer, 
le  petrir;  and  Vronsky  at  the  same  time  has  a  similar 
dream.  And  at  the  catastrophe,  when  Anna  throws 
herself  beneath  the  train,  "a  peasant,  muttering  some- 
*  From  an  essay  by  Mr,  F.  A.  Postnikov. 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KaAENIN"   m 

thing,  was  working  at  the  iron  above  her."  Thus  a 
sense  of  impending  tragedy  pervades  the  whole  work, 
in  contrast  to  War  and  Peace,  in  which  the  reader,  like 
the  actors  themselves,  is  quite  ignorant  what  fate  may 
have.in  store. 

The  concession  to  conventional  construction,  impor- 
tant in  the  comparison  of  this  novel  with  other  works 
by  Tolstoy,  is  after  all  very  slight:  Anna  Karenin 
abounds  in  episodes  and  descriptions  that  have  no  pos- 
sible bearing  on  Anna's  story.  The  contrast  of  her 
tragic  fate  with  the  commonplace  happiness  of  I^evin 
and  Kitty  is  not  worked  out  with  any  balancing  of  de- 
tail; the  two  stories  run  side  by  side  almost  indepen- 
dently; Tolstoy  develops  one  of  them  to  a  convenient 
stopping  place  and  then  turns  to  the  other.  Often 
Anna's  fortunes  seem  to  be  no  more  than  an  episode  in 
the  novel  that  bears  her  name.  Her  love  of  Vronsky 
and  its  consequences  could  have  been  told  more  neatly, 
and  in  a  sense  more  effectively,  by  a  dozen  inferior 
novelists  than  by  Tolstoy,  with  his  apparent  prodigality 
of  good  material. 

One  inquires  involuntarily  whether  Tolstoy  really 
fails  to  understand  his  own  art;  whether  he  actually 
wastes  good  material  because  he  does  not  know  how 
to  employ  it  effectively.  A  single  illustration  will  show 
that  he  is  really  a  master  of  compressed,  vivid  sugges- 
tion. Anna  Karenin  is  a  woman  of  about  thirty,  who 
has  been  living  for  eight  years  with  a  husband  seme 
twenty  years  older  than  herself  i  their  if 


m  TOLSTOY 

not  blissful,  at  least  not  the  reverse.  She  has  respected 
and  admired  her  husband  and  has  been  faithful  to  him 
from  conviction  as  well  as  from  convention.  Then  she 
leaves  him  for  a  few  days,  in  order  to  visit  the  family  of 
her  brother  in  Moscow.  There,  at  a  dancing  party,  she 
meets  Vronsky,  a  handsome  young  oflficer,  and,  without 
herself  being  conscious  of  the  fact,  she  falls  in  love  with 
him.  He  returns  to  St.  Petersburg  on  the  same  train 
with  her,  and  seizes  an  opportunity  for  telling  her  of 
his  passion  for  her.  Her  mind  is  filled  with  her  new 
interests.  At  the  station  in  St.  Petersburg  her  husband 
meets  her: 

In  St.  Petersburg,  as  soon  as  the  train  stopped  and  she  got 
out  of  the  railway  carriage,  the  first  face  that  attracted  her 
attention  was  the  face  of  her  husband.  "O  heavens,  where 
did  he  ever  get  such  ears?"  she  thought,  looking  at  his  cold 
and  stately  figure,  and  especially  at  what  had  so  startled  her 
now,  the  cartilages  of  his  ears,  which  supported  the  sides  of  his 
round  bat. — [Part  i,  ch.  30.] 

For  eight  years  she  had  lived  with  him  and  ixever 
noticed  his  ears,  just  as  no  man  notices  or  cares  for  any 
small  physical  defect  or  ugKness  in  those  near  and 
dear  to  him.  Now  she  sees  those  ears — ^and  they 
continue  to  stick  out  during  all  the  rest  of  the 
novel.  In  a  half-dozen  lines  Tolstoy  has  shown  the  pro- 
found change  that  has  come  over  the  woman's^  whole 
mind. 
Why  then  is  Tolstoy,  throughout  the  book,  so  lavish 


"WAR  AND  PEACE'*  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"  193 

of  detail  that  tells  nothing  of  Anna?  Because  he  is 
striving  to  give  a  picture  not  of  Anna  alone,  but  of  a 
whole  world  of  complicated,  conflicting  interests.  Though 
he  has  here  chosen  a  narrower  field  than  in  War  and 
Peace,  he  has  not  essentially  changed  his  ideals  and  his 
methods  of  work.  The  portrayal  of  a  great  company 
of  men  and  women  is  his  primary  interest  rather  than 
the  telling  of  an  absorbing  tale  of  guilty  love.  Varenka, 
Nikolay  Levin,  Agafya  Mikhaylovna,  all  claim  his  af- 
fection as  well  as  Anna. 

Tolstoy's  concessions  to  convention  are  very  shght 
even  in  the  story  of  Anna  herself.  Anna  has  a  premoni- 
tion that  she  will  die  in  childbirth.  By  her  bedside  her 
husband  and  her  lover  are  reconciled:  Karenih,  a 
leatherish,  documentary  person,  is  touched  to  the  quick 
so  that  he  shows  the  inward  fineness  of  his  nature  and 
forgives  from  his  whole  heart  the  man  who  has  wronged 
him;  Vronsky  has  a  sudden  realization  of  the  sin  that 
he  has  committed.  The  scene,  as  Mr.  Howells  has  said 
with  truth,*  rises  to  heights  unmatched  in  all  fiction. 
By  all  ordinary  rules  of  hterary  construction  Anna 
should  now  die  and  the  two  men  remain  united  by  a 
common  sorrow.  But  she  recovers.  Karenin  returns, 
from  the  heights  of  emotion  to  his  office  routine,  and  his 
ears  stick  out  just  as  they  did  before.  Anna  leaves 
him  and  lives  with  her  lover.  Karenin  is  minded  to 
give  her  a  divorce,  but,  falling  under  the  control  of  some 
pseudo-religious  hypocrites,  resists  his  natural  feeling 
*  In  My  Literary  Passions. 


194  TOLSTOY 

of  compassion,  and  refuses  to  do  so.  Anna,  living  with 
Vronsky,  but  with  no  legal  claim  on  him,  finds  that  she 
is  slowly  losing  her  former  unbounded  power  over  his 
affections — and  she  kills  herself  in  a  moment  of  jealousy 
and  despair. 

Indeed  this  novel,  like  all  Tolstoy's  work,  Impresses 
the  reader  as  having  grown  like  some  living  organism, 
instead  of  having  been  put  together  Hke  a  piece  of  ma- 
chinery. It  is  an  illustration  of  a  great  esthetic  truth 
that  has  been  well  expressed  by  Sellar: 

How  the  great  impersonations  of  poetry  and  prose  fiction, 
which  are  more  real  to  our  imaginations  than  the  personages  of 
history  or  those  whom  we  know  in  life,  come  into  being,  is  a 
question  which  probably  their  authors  themselves  could  not 
answer.  Though  reflection  on  human  nature  and  deliberate 
intention  to  exemplify  some  law  of  life  may  precede  the  creative 
act  which  gives  them  being,  and  though  continued  reflection 
may  be  needed  to  sustain  them  in  a  consistent  course,  yet  no 
mere  analytic  insight  into  the  springs  of  action  can  explain  the 
process  by  which  a  great  artist  works.  The  beings  of  his  im- 
agination seem  to  acquire  an  existence  independent  of  the 
experience  and  of  the  deliberate  intentions  of  their  author, 
and  to  inform  this  experience  and  mold  these  intentions  as 
much  as  they  are  informed  and  molded  by  them. — [The  Ro- 
man Poets  of  the  Augustan  Age:  Virgil  (Oxford,  1877),  pp. 
399,  400.] 

Tolstoy  himself  bears  witness  to  this  artistic  experi- 
ence. In  a  letter  to  Strakhov  he  tells  how  he  came 
to  write  of  Vronsky's  attempt  at  suicide,  which  immedi- 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"195 

ately  follows  the  interview  with  Karenin  that  has  just 
been  described: 

In  everything,  almost  everything  that  I  have  written,  I 
have  been  guided  by  a  need  for  the  gathering  of  thoughts, 
connected  with  one  another  for  self-expression;  but  every 
thought,  expressed  separately  in  words,  loses  its  sense  and 
is  frightfully  degraded  when  it  is  taken  alone,  outside  its 
connection  with  others.  And  the  connection  itself  is  formed 
not  by  thought  (in  my  opinion),  but  by  something  else, 
and  to  express  the  basis  of  this  connection  immediately 
by  words  is  impossible:  that  can  be  done  only  mediately, 
by  words  that  describe  images,  acts,  situations.  You  know 
all  this  better  than  I  do,  but  I  have  been  interested  in  the 
point  recently.  One  of  the  most  evident  proofs  of  it  for  me  was 
the  suicide  of  Vronsky,  which  you  liked.  The  point  was  never 
so  clear  to  me  before.  The  chapter  describing  how  Vronsky 
accepted  his  part  after  his  interview  with  the  husband  had 
been  long  since  written.  I  began  to  correct  it,  and  quite 
unexpectedly  for  me,  but  beyond  any  doubt  whatever,  Vronsky 
started  to  shoot  himself.  Now  it  appears  that  this  was  or- 
ganically indispensable  for  what  follows. — [Biryukov:  II,  215.1 

Anna  Karenin  is  one  of  the  great  love  stories  of  the 
world.  Yet  never  does  one  character  in  the  novel  pour 
out  his  feelings  to  another  in  words  of  poetic  eloquence; 
the  confessions  of  love  are  like  those  of  real  life,  some- 
times through  short,  earnest  speeches,  more  often  by- 
mere  hints  and  implications:  Anna  and  Vronsky  at  the 
ball  learn  of  their  mutual  attraction  by  a  subtle  mental 
telegraphjr^^as  they  chat  on  indifferent  topics.     We  fol- 


196  TOLSTOY 

low  the  course  of  Anna's  passion  not  by  her  words, 
not  often  even  by  her  conscious  thoughts,  but  by  her 
V  changed  attitude  to  the  world  about  her,  to  Dolly's 
\  children,  to  Kitty,  to  her  husband,  to  St.  Petersburg 
society.  We  feel  her  passion  rather  than  learn  of  it. 
In  the  same  way,  though  less  subtly,  more  consciously, 
we  are  made  to  feel  Levin's  growing  happiness.  Here, 
as  everywhere,  we  become  acquainted  with  Tolstoy's 
men  and  women  as  with  those  of  a  new  city  in  which 
we  have  taken  up  our  home. 

Anna  Karenin  is  a  novel  of  the  conscience.  Scenes 
of  fine,  vigorous,  physical  life  abound  in  it,  to  be  sure, 
as  in  the  picture  of  the  mowing,  where  Levin,  his  moist 
shirt  clinging  to  his  aching  back,  strains  every  muscle 
in  order  to  keep  pace  with  his  peasant  laborers.  With 
Levin,  too,  we  rejoice  in  the  coming  of  spring,  thawing, 
•  gurghng,  sprouting,  rustling;  here  we  gaze  on  nature 
with  a  farmer's  eyes,  as  in  War  and  Peace  with  a  hunter's. 
Yet  the  hunter  has  his  share  too,  even  though  he  be 
only  the  unadventurous  shooter  of  woodcock,  in  a  fine 
chapter  describing  an  evening's  sport  of  Levin  and 
Stepan  Arkadyevich.  But  the  spiritual  life  of  the 
characters  furnishes  the  primary  interest  of  the  book. 
The  theories  of  War  and  Peace  have  disappeared;  Tol- 
stoy is  no  longer  interested  in  abstract  speculation,  even 
of  his  own  nihilistic  sort.  Plain,  ordinary,  every-day  con- 
duct is  his  theme;  he  might  be  telling  the  story  of  the  later 
life  of  Audrey  Bolkonsky  and  Pierre  Bezukhov,  after 
they  had  recovered  from  day  dreams  of  public  activity. 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"197 

On  one  important  matter,  however,  Anna  Karenin 
shows  us  a  significant  change  in  Tolstoy's  view  of  the 
state  and  of  the  individual  man's  attitude  towards  it. 
In  Sevastopol  he  had  described  war  with  a  feeling  of 
horror  at  the  sufferings  caused  by  it,  but  with  no  attempt 
to  reason  upon  its  existence  or  to  trace  its  cause.  In 
War  and  Peace  it  had  become  the  vast,  inscrutable 
product  of  fate,  rebellion  at  which  would  be  futile.  In 
Anna  Karenin  Levin  expresses  a  more  commonplace 
point  of  view: 

"My  theory  is  this:  war,  on  the  one  hand,  is  such  an  animal, 
cruel,  and  terrible  thing  that  no  single  man,  not  to  speak  of  a 
Christian,  can  take  upon  himself  the  responsibility  for  the 
beginning  of  war;  of  that  the  government  alone  is  capable, 
which  is  summoned  to  do  so  and  is  inevitably  brought  into 
war.  On  the  other  hand  both  science  and  common  sense  teach 
us  that  in  state  matters,  and  especially  in  the  matter  of  war, 
citizens  renounce  their  personal  will." — [Part  vin,  ch.  15.] 

Tolstoy's  conscience  rebels  at  war,  but  the  former  artil- 
lery officer  is  still  a  loyal  subject  of  the  tsar,  and  at  the 
bidding  of  the  state  authorities  will  stifle  its  demands. 
Soon  conscience  will  gain  the  upper  hand,  and  Tolstoy 
will  denounce  the  very  existence  of  the  state  as  a  clog 
upon  it. 

Puritan  though  he  be  in  his  point  of  view,  Tolstoy  is 
still  broad  in  his  sympathies,  showing  wonderful  charity 
to  sins  that  come  from  the  animal  nature  and  that 
have  not  destroyed  goodness  of  heart.  Stepan  Arka- 
dyevich  Oblonsky,  Anna's  sybarite,  kind-hearted  brother. 


198  TOLSTOY 

violates  nearly  every  law  of  the  decalogue,  and  yet  he 
receives  from  his  creator  a  Fielding-like  indulgence.  To 
waste  sermons  on  him  would  be  as  foolish  as  to  lecture 
a  kitten  for  steaHng  cream;  his  geniahty  and  freedom 
from  malice  preserve  him  from  reprobation.  Tolstoy 
reserves  his  scorn  for  creatures  like  the  Princess  Betsy, 
outwardly  respectable,  but  with  neither  morals  nor 
kindliness  to  recommend  them,  who  are  not  only  vicious 
themselves,  but  the  cause  of  viciousness  in  others.  Yet 
even  for  her  and  for  her  fellows  he  shows  contempt 
rather  than  wrath:  such  persons  are  outside  the  world 
in  which  he  is  interested,  though  not  outside  that  which 
he  sees.  Tolstoy  is  little  attracted  even  by  the  most 
moral  men  of  bookish  theories  or  purely  external  in- 
terests, by  the  sociologist  Koznyshev  and  the  Liberal 
county  politician  Sviyazhsky.  They  debate  great 
questions  or  adopt  pubhc  measures  without  relating 
them  to  their  personal  conduct,  which  flows  on  in  ac- 
customed, routine  channels.  Tolstoy  reserves  his  per- 
sonal attention,  so  to  speak,  for  Anna  and  Vronsky, 
Levin  and  Kitty,  Dolly,  the  careworn  wife  of  Stepan 
Arkd;dyevich,  and  (to  some  extent)  for  Karenin — human 
beings  who  have  a  certain  depth  of  emotion,  a  "  force  of 
life,"  to  use  Tolstoy's  own  term;  who  both  reason  about 
vjife's  problems  and  feel  them,  and  who  strive  to  shape 
tjieir  lives  in  accord  with  this  reasoned  emotion. 

What  then  is  Tolstoy's  attitude  towards  the  central 
figure  of  his  novel,  towards  the  lovely  and  fascinating 
Anna,  the  unfaithful  wife  and  the  pitiful  victim.'^    Does 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"199 

he  sympathize  with  her  or  does  he  cast  a  stone?  In  a 
sense  he  does  both.  To  his  book  he  prefixes  the  tre- 
mendous biblical  minatory  motto:  "Vengeance  is  mine; 
I  will  repay"  (Romans  xii,  19).  A  reader  involuntarily 
connects  this  with  Anna's  fate;  vengeance  has  overtaken 
the  sinner.  But  to  this  simple  explanation  there  are 
decided  objections.  From  the  point  of  view  of  Russian 
high  society,  to  which  Anna  belongs,  adultery  is  a  trivial 
offence,  a  mere  peccadillo.  The  Russian  critic  Skabi- 
ehevsky  compares  Tolstoy's  treatment  of  this  ordinary 
society  transgression  to  the  act  of  a  man  attacking  flies 
with  an  axe.  Tolstoy  himself  sees  that  from  a  social 
point  of  view  Anna's  offence  lies  not  in  her  unfaithful- 
ness, but  in  her  frankness  and  in  her  intensity  of  nature. 
Had  she  been  content  to  live  in  her  husband's  house 
and  keep  up  the  appearance  of  respectability,  according 
to  his  charge,  no  tragedy  need  have  followed.  Princess 
Betsy  is  living  in  prosperous  security  at  the  close  of  the 
novel.  Vronsky's  mother  is  gratified  when  she  hears  of 
her  son's  connection  with  Anna,  "because  nothing,  ac- 
cording to  her  idea,  gave  the  last  finish  to  a  brilliant 
young  man  like  a  liaison  in  high  society,  and  because 
Madam  Karenin,  who  had  pleased  her  so  much  and  who 
had  talked  so  much  about  her  own  son,  had  after  all 
turned  out  to  be  just  such  a  person  as  were  all  beautiful 
and  well-bred  women,  according  to  the  ideas  of  the 
Countess  Vronsky  ";*  she  is  grieved  when  she  learns  that 

*  Part  II,  ch.  18.    The  opinion  reflects  that  of  Tolstoy's  "Aunt  Taty- 

ana'*;  see  Confession,  ch»  2, 


goo  TOLSTOY 

this  is  no  mere  brilliant  and  graceful  society  intrigue, 
but  a  deep  and  lasting  passion,  which  may  involve  her 
son  in  foolish  acts  and  affect  his  professional  career. 
Later,  had  Karenin  been  willing  to  grant  Anna  a  divorce, 
so  that  she  and  Vronsky  might  have  married  and  recov- 
ered some  social  position,  all  might  yet  have  been  well, 
or  at  least  no  tragedy  need  have  followed.  But  he  re- 
fuses, and  Anna  lives  with  Vronsky  in  defiance  not  so 
much  of  moral  standards  as  of  social  conventions  that 
are  no  better  than  a  parody  of  morality.  Anna  never 
in  the  novel  shows  any  remorse  for  her  desertion  of  her 
husband.  Her  suffering  comes  first  from  the  snubs 
that  she  receives  from  her  former  society  associates, 
which  force  her  to  concentrate  her  whole  life  in  her 
lover;  and,  second,  from  her  jealous  despair  when  she 
discovers  that  her  lover  is  beginning  to  have  a  life  in- 
dependent of  her  own  and  that  she  is  unable  to  control 
his  every  thought. 

In  face  of  this  diflSculty,  one  might  be  tempted  to 
apply  the  motto  to  the  whole  society  of  which  Anna 
forms  a  part;  to  regard  the  novel  as  a  philippic  against 
modern  society  like  the  later  What  Shall  We  Do  Then? 
or  Resurrection.  But  Tolstoy  gives  no  intimation  of 
such  an  intent  in  the  volume  itself;  he  has  not  yet  be- 
come a  prophet  preaching  against  the  modern  Babylon. 
Or  one  might  interpret  the  motto  in  accord  with  Tol- 
stoy's later  cardinal  doctrine,  that  sinful  man  (in  the 
person  of  the  reader)  should  not  pass  judgment  on  his 
neighbor's  conduct:  "'Vengeance  is  mwe;  7  will  repay,' 


"WAH  AND  PEACE"  AND  **ANNA  KAEENIN**20l 

saith  the  Lord."  But  such  an  interpretation  is  impos- 
sible, for  in  the  novel  Tolstoy  constantly  forces  the  moral 
issue  on  the  reader's  attention,  compelling  him  to  judge 
between  Anna  and  Levin. 

The  solution  of  the  enigma  may  be  found  in  the 
peculiar  duality  of  Tolstoy's  nature  and  his  art.  On 
the  one  side  he  is  a  moraHst  who  constantly  grows 
more  strict  and  ascetic;  on  the  other  he  is  a  clear- 
sighted painter  of  life  as  it  actually  exists.  Breach  of 
the  marriage  vows  may  be  a  peccadillo  for  Russian  so- 
ciety; for  Tolstoy  it  is  a  crime  of  capital  moment. 
Tolstoy  cannot  think  of  adultery  as  "light  and  playful";* 
he  feels  that  it  is  serious:  his  point  of  view  is  that  of  the 
Puritan  Hawthorne  in  The  Scarlet  Letter.  Levin  reflects 
his  creator's  temperament,  and  in  his  happy  married 
life,  based  as  it  is  on  mutual  love  and  self-sacrifices, 
realizes  his  ideal.  Anna,  led  astray  by  the  lust  of  the 
flesh,  goes  to  ruin;  Tolstoy  is  wilfully  blind  to  the 
fact  that  her  sin  and  her  fate  have  no  necessary  con- 
nection. The  Princess  Betsy  and  Stepan  Arkadyevich 
are  both  outside  Tolstoy's  moral  world;  he  reasons  about 
neither,  but  as  a  man  he  despises  the  one  and  likes  the 
other.  From  his  presentation  of  life,  as  from  life  itself, 
one  may  draw  various  conclusions.  Tolstoy's  own 
spiritual  vision  is  clear  and  single,  but  he  will  not  let 
it  warp  his  picture  of  what  actually  goes  on  in  the 
world  about  him. 

To  Levin,  Tolstoy  gives  much  of  his  own  individuality; 
*See  page  155. 


202  TOLSTOY 

his  own  brooding  search  for  spiritual  truth,  his  aversion 
for  government  activity,  his  passion  for  out-of-door  Hfe, 
his  new-found  faith  in  physical  labor  as  a  cure  for 
spiritual  ills.  But  he  imparts  to  him  none  of  his  own 
universality  of  interests,  of  his  high  breeding  or  personal 
magnetism.  Levin  attains  spiritual  salvation  in  quiet 
farm  work  and  in  his  family  ties.  The  church  he  toler- 
ates, though  it  means  little  to  him;  among  the  humble 
peasants  he  finds  the  best  stimulus  to  the  spiritual  hfe. — 
As  an  artistic  creation  Levin  is  not  a  complete  success; 
he  resembles  too  much  the  pattern  good  boy  of  the 
Sunday-school  books.  And  yet  his  personahty,  tiresome 
at  first  for  readers  who  are  eager  to  press  on  with  Anna's 
thrilling  story,  gains  with  each  fresh  perusal  of  the 
novel.  At  last  we  come  closer  to  Levin  and  forgive 
him  his  virtues.  A  contrast  of  the  two  paragraphs  in 
which  Tolstoy  says  farewell  to  each  of  these  characters 
will  show  us  the  author's  point  of  view  towards  them, 
which  is  after  all  our  grandmother's  point  of  view,  that 
to  which  we  are  all  gradually  drawing  closer  as  we  leave 
our  youth  behind  us. 

This  is  our  last  ghmpse  of  Anna  in  life: 

She  had  intended  to  fall  under  the  center  of  the  first  rail- 
way carriage,  which  had  come  up  opposite  to  her;  but  the  red 
bag,  which  she  had  begun  to  take  off  her  arm,  checked  her, 
and  it  was  too  late :  the  center  had  passed  by  her.  She  had  to 
wait  for  the  following  carriage.  A  feeling  such  as  she  used 
to  experience  when  bathing,  when  about  to  enter  the  water, 
seized  her,  and  she  crossed  herself.    The  wonted  gesture  of 


r 


"WAR  AND  PEACE"  AND  "ANNA  KARENIN"203 

making  the  sign  of  the  cross  called  up  in  her  soul  a  whole 
succession  of  girlish  and  childish  memories,  and  suddenly 
the  darkness  that  had  concealed  everything  from  her  parted, 
and  life  rose  before  her  for  a  moment  with  all  its  bright  past 
joys.  But  shs  did  not  lower  her  eyes  from  the  wheels  of  the 
second  carriage  that  was  approaching.  And  Just  at  the  mo- 
ment when  the  space  between  the  wheels  came  even  with  her, 
she  threw  aside  the  red  bag,  and,  drawing  her  head  into  her 
shoulders,  fell  under  the  carriage  on  her  hands,  and  with  a 
light  movement,  as  if  preparing  to  rise  again  immediately, 
dropped  upon  her  knees.  And  at  the  same  instant  she  was 
horrified  at  what  she  was  doing.  "Where  am  I.''  What  am  I 
doing.''  Why?"  She  wanted  to  rise  and  throw  herself  back; 
but  something  huge  and  implacable  struck  her  upon  the 
head  and  tugged  at  her  back.  "Lord,  forgive  me  all!"  she  said, 
feeling  the  impossibility  of  struggle.  A  peasant,  muttering 
something,  was  working  at  the  iron  above  her.  And  the  candle 
by  which  she  had  read  the  book  filled  with  troubles,  deceits, 
grief,  and  evil,  flashed  up  with  a  brighter  light  than  ever, 
illumined  for  her  all  that  had  before  been  in  darkness,  sput- 
tered, began  to  grow  dim,  and  was  extinguished  forever. — 
[Part  VII,  ch.  31.] 

And  this  is  the  last  thought  of  Levin,  with  which  the 
novel  closes: 

"Just  as  before,  I  shall  get  angry  with  Ivdn  the  coachman, 
I  shall  dispute,  I  shall  express  my  thoughts  at  the  wrong  time; 
there  will  be  the  same  wall  between  the  holy  of  holies  of  my 
soul  and  other  people,  even  my  wife;  just  in  the  same  way 
as  before  I  shall  blame  her  for  my  own  terror  and  repent 
doing  so;   just  as  before  I  shall  fail  to  understand  with  my 


204  TOLSTOY 

reason  why  I  pray  and  yet  I  shall  continue  to  pray — but  my 
life  now,  my  whole  life,  independently  of  anything  that  can 
happen  to  me,  every  moment  of  it,  is  not  only  not  bereft  of 
meaning,  as  it  was  before,  but  has  the  undoubted  meaning  of 
good,  which  I  have  power  to  implant  in  it!"* 

Living  on  his  secluded  estate,  aloof  from  the  literary 
circles  of  Russia,  Tolstoy  had  written  the  two  finest 
novels  of  Europe.  Now  he  will  turn  aside  from  artistic 
creation,  in  order  to  work  out  within  himself  a  new 
religious  conception  of  life.  He  will  attain  a  place 
among  great  religious  leaders  as  well  as  among  great 
men  of  letters. 

*  The  writer  is  indebted  here  and  elsewhere  to  suggestions  from  lec- 
tures by  Mr.  Robert  Herrick. 


CHAPTER  VII 


THE  crisis;   the  religious  system 


[TO  his  fiction,  as  we  nave  seen,  Tolstoy  has 
constantly  introduced  characters  who  are  to 
a  greater  or  less  extent  reproductions  of 
his  own  personality:  Nikolay  Irtenyev, 
Olenin,  Prince  Audrey  Bolkonsky,  Pierre  Bezukhov,  and, 
above  all,  Levin.  These  accounts  at  second  hand,  so 
to  speak,  of  his  own  spiritual  experiences  are  long  and 
analytical  studies  that  suggest  George  Eliot.  Now,  in 
1879,  he  suddenly  tells  us  with  startling  directness  and 
force  the  story  of  his  own  spiritual  life,  in  his  Confession, 
This  little  book  of  only  eighty  pages  will  ever  remain 
a  classic  among  religious  autobiographies.  It  is  so  vivid, 
so  compressed,  so  powerful,  that  one  wishes  to  cite  it 
entire  rather  than  to  give  a  mere  summary  of  its  contents. 
Tolstoy  tells  first  of  his  boyhood,  how  he  was  educated 
in  the  faith  of  the  Russian  Orthodox  Church,  but  very 
early  lost  that  faith;  more  accurately,  he  never  had 
genuine  faith,  but  a  mere  wavering  confidence  in  what 
others  had  taught  him.  His  defection  was  like  that  of 
the  immense  majority  of  people  of  his  own  class  of  so- 
ciety, who  were  forced  to  remain  legally  members  of  the 

205 


^06  TOLSTOY 

Orthodox  Church,  but  who  were  at  heart  indifferent  to 
it.  "Then  as  now  pubhc  recognition  and  profession  of 
orthodoxy  was  found  for  the  most  part  among  people 
who  were  dull  and  cruel  and  who  regarded  themselves 
as  very  important.  But  intellect,  honor,  uprightness, 
kindliness,  and  morality  were  for  the  most  part  found 
in  men  who  confessed  themselves  to  be  unbelievers." 
As  for  Tolstoy  himself:  "I  believed  in  God,  or  rather  I 
did  not  deny  God — ^but  in  what  God  I  should  not  have 
been  able  to  say.  Neither  did  I  deny  Christ  and  his 
teaching,  but  in  what  his  teaching  consisted  I  should  also 
have  been  unable  to  say."  He  tried  to  lead  a  moral  life, 
but  was  ridiculed  for  his  efforts  by  others.  His  real 
faith  was  in  self-perfection,  which  in  practice  was  merely 
a  struggle  to  be  better  than  other  men  according  to  other 
men's  standards,  to  be  more  famous,  more  important, 
and  more  wealthy  than  others.  His  life  during  his  young 
manhood  he  describes  as  follows : 

/  I  cannot  recall  these  years  without  horror,  disgust,  and 
sickness  of  heart.  I  killed  men  in  war,  I  challenged  them  to 
duels  in  order  to  kill  them;  I  squandered  money  at  cards,  I 
ate  up  the  toil  of  peasants;  I  punished  them;  I  fornicated,  I 
deceived.  Lying,  theft,  lust  of  all  sorts,  drunkenness,  violence, 
murder.  .  .  .  There  was  no  crime  that  I  might  not  have 
committed;  and  for  all  that  the  men  of  my  own  age  praised  me 
and  regarded  me,  and  still  regard  me,  as  a  comparatively  moral 
man.— [Ch.  2.] 

All  this  means,  of  course,  that  Tolstoy's  life  was  that 
of  an  average  young  man  of  society;  one  must  not  take 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      207 

too  seriously  the  words  of  a  convert  as  to  his  life  before 
conversion:  we  have  already  passed  in  review  the 
details  of  his  outward  existence.* 

Winning  fame  as  an  author,  Tolstoy  fancied  himself 
a  teacher,  though  he  did  not  know  what  he  was  teach- 
ing; he  accepted  the  point  of  view  of  his  Liberal  asso- 
ciates, including  their  faith  in  progress.  Disenchanted 
with  this,  he  grew  sick,  mentally  rather  than  physically, 
but  was  saved  from  despair  by  his  marriage  and  by  the 
new  interests  that  came  with  it: 

Despite  the  fact  that  I  regarded  authorship  as  a  trifle  dur- 
ing these  fifteen  years  [after  marriage],  I  nevertheless  con- 
tinued to  write.  I  had  already  tasted  the  seduction  of  author- 
ship, the  seduction  of  huge  financial  profit  and  of  the  applause 
given  me  for  my  insignificant  labor,  and  I  gave  myself  up  to 
it,  as  a  means  of  bettering  my  material  position  and  for  stifling  in 
my  soul  all  questions  of  the  sense  of  my  life  and  of  life  in 
general.  I  wrote,  teaching  what  for  me  was  the  sole  truth, 
that  one  must  so  live  as  to  gain  most  prosperity  for  himself 
and  his  family. — [Ch.  3.] 

But  now  questions  began  to  occur  to  Tolstoy:  What 
is  the  true  aim  of  life.?  What  permanent  meaning  can 
there  be  to  man's  existence,  and  in  particular  to  that  of 
Leo  Tolstoy.? 

In  the  midst  of  my  thoughts  about  my  farming,  which  in- 
terested me  greatly  at  the  time,  there  suddenly  would  come 
into  my  head  the  question:   *'Very  well,  you  will  have  16,000 

*  In  particular,  compare  pp.  9-14,  76,  77,  above. 


^08  TOLSTOY 

acres  in  the  province  of  Samara,  and  three  hundred  head  of 
horses — and  then?"  .  .  .  And  I  was  quite  at  a  loss  and  did 
not  know  what  to  think  next.  .  .  .  Or,  thinking  of  the  fame 
that  my  works  would  gain  for  me,  I  said  to  myself:  "Very 
well,  you  will  be  more  famous  than  Gogol,  Pushkin,  Shake- 
speare, and  Moliere,  than  all  the  writers  in  the  world — well, 
what  of  it?"  And  I  could  make  absolutely  no  answer.  These 
questions  will  not  wait;  one  must  answer  them  at  once:  if 
you  do  not  answer,  you  cannot  live.  But  there  is  no  answer. 
I  felt  that  the  foundation  on  which  I  had  been  standing 
had  broken  down,  that  I  had  nothing  to  stand  on;  that  what 
I  had  been  living  by  no  longer  existed,  and  that  I  had  nothing 
to  live  by.— [Ch.  3.] 

Thus  Tolstoy,  rich,  famous,  and  prosperous,  was 
driven  to  the  brink  of  suicide,  and  had  to  hide  from 
temptations  to  shoot  or  to  hang  himself: 

My  question,  that  which  at  fifty  years  of  age  had  led  me 
towards  suicide,  was  the  most  simple  question,  one  which  lies 
in  the  soul  of  every  man,  from  a  silly  child  to  the  wisest  sage, 
the  question  without  which  life  is  impossible,  as  I  had  ex- 
perienced in  actual  fact.  The  question  is  as  follows:  What 
will  result  from  what  I  am  doing  now  and  shall  do  to-morrow? 
What  will  result  from  my  whole  life? 

Otherwise  expressed,  the  question  will  be  as  follows:  Why 
should  I  live,  why  should  I  desire  anything,  why  should  I  do 
anything?  Or  the  question  may  be  expressed  still  otherwise: 
Is  there  in  my  life  a  meaning  which  would  not  be  annihilated 
by  the  inevitable  death  that  awaits  me? — [Ch.  5.] 

This  pondering  upon  life's  ultimate,  fundamental 
question  is  the  root  of  Tolstoy's  entire  religious  system. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM     209 

and,  one  may  add,  the  root  of  all  religious  belief  and  of 
all  philosophy  that  is  developed  independently  by  a 
man  and  not  borrowed  as  a  whole  from  some  other  per- 
son or  institution.  Such  doubts  and  perplexities  come 
at  times  into  the  life  of  every  thinking  man.  But  an 
Anglo-Saxon  is  not  apt  to  be  driven  by  them  into  de- 
spair or  melancholia;  he  will  reach  despair,  if  at  all, 
through  misfortunes  of  the  fleshly,  material  hfe,  through 
vice  or  disappointment.  To  the  brooding,  emotional 
Russian  the  question  is  not  so  much  a  mental  game  or 
business  as  a  vital  problem,  profoundly  affecting  con- 
duct. For  the  proof  of  this  one  may  turn  to  the  reflec- 
tion of  Russian  life  in  the  works  of  Turgenev  and 
Dostoyevsky  as  well  as  in  those  of  Tolstoy  himself. 
Meditation  on  fundamental  problems  rather  than  action 
on  instinctive  or  half-considered  premises,  is  a  charac- 
teristic of  the  Russian  temperament. 

Having  once  clearly  put  the  question  to  himself,  Tol- 
stoy set  out  to  solve  it.  He  asked  a  solution  of  science, 
but  science  could  give  no  answer  to  his  great  and  fun- 
damental question;  it  was  either  vague  and  equivocal 
or  else  contemptuous: 

If  you  turn  to  the  group  of  sciences  that  tries  to  give 
solutions  to  the  questions  of  life,  to  physiology,  psychology, 
biology,  sociology,  then  you  encounter  a  startling  poverty  of 
thought,  the  most  extreme  obscurity,  an  utterly  unjustified 
pretense  at  solving  irrelevant  questions,  and  constant  contradic- 
tions of  one  thinker  with  another  and  even  with  himself. 
If  you  turn  to  the  group  of  sciences  that  do  not  undertake  the 


210  TOLSTOY 

solution  of  questions  of  life,  but  answer  their  own  special 
scientific  questions,  then  you  are  enraptured  with  the  might 
of  the  human  mind,  but  you  know  in  advance  that  there  are  no 
answers  to  questions  of  life.  These  sciences  frankly  ignore  the 
question  of  life.  They  say:  "To  the  query  what  you  are  and 
why  you  live,  we  have  no  answers,  and  that  is  not  our  line;  but 
now  if  you  want  to  know  the  laws  of  light,  of  chemical  com- 
pounds, the  laws  of  the  development  of  organisms;  ...  if 
you  want  to  know  the  laws  of  your  own  mind,  then  for 
all  that  we  have  clear,  exact,  and  indubitable  answers." 
— [Ch.  5.] 

Tolstoy's  question,  and  his  failure  to  receive  a  reply, 
were  the  same  as  those  of  the  Persian  Omar: 

Myself  when  young  did  eagerly  frequent 
Doctor  and  Saint,  and  heard  great  argument 

About  it  and  about :  but  evermore 
Came  out  by  the  same  door  where  in  I  went. 

With  them  the  seed  of  Wisdom  did  I  sow. 

And  with  my  own  hand  wrought  to  make  it  grow; 

And  this  was  all  the  Harvest  that  I  reap'd — 
"I  came  like  Water,  and  like  Wind  I  go." 

Up  from  Earth's  Center  through  the  Seventh  Gate 
I  rose,  and  on  the  Throne  of  Saturn  sate. 

And  many  a  Knot  unravell'd  by  the  Road; 
But  not  the  Master-knot  of  human  Fate. 

There  was  the  Door  to  which  I  found  no  Key; 
There  was  the  Veil  through  which  I  could  not  see; 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM     ni 

Some  little  talk  awhile  of  Me  and  Thee 
There  was — ^and  then  no  more  of — Thee  and  Me. 

Earth  could  not  answer;  nor  the  Seas  that  mourn 
In  flowing  Purple,  of  their  Lord  forlorn; 

Nor  rolling  Heaven,  with  all  his  Signs  revealed 
And  hidden  by  the  sleeve  of  Night  and  Morn. 

And  the  plain  prose  of  the  modern  realist  expresses  the 
tragedy  of  the  situation  as  vividly  as  the  poetry  of  the 
Persian  sceptic  and  his  translator. 

Doubtful  of  his  own  powers,  Tolstoy  wondered  whether 
the  wise  men  of  other  times  and  nations  had  been  per- 
plexed by  the  same  problem,  and  whether  they  had 
perchance  been  able  to  solve  it.  And  he  inquired  of 
Socrates,  the  wisest  man  of  ancient  Greece,  of  Solomon 
(or  whoever  wrote  the  book  of  Ecclesiastes),*  the  repre- 
sentative of  ancient  Hebrew  wisdom,  of  Buddha,  the 
sage  of  ancient  India,  and  of  Schopenhauer,  the  greatest 
philosopher  of  modern  Germany.  In  each  case  the 
reply  was  the  same:  life  here  on  earth  is  evil  and  futile; 
death  is  better  than  life;  the  problem  of  existence  is  to 
find  an  escape  from  existence.  Tolstoy  was  convinced 
that  his  reasoning  had  been  correct;  that  there  was  no 
answer  to  his  query. 

But  an  escape  from  this  reasoning  might  perhaps  be 
found  in  the  actual  experience  of  the  mass  of  humanity. 

*Yet,  curiously  enough,  in  1879  Tolstoy  wrote  to  Fet  of  Ecclesiastes 
as  a  new  book,  which  he  had  just  read  (Biryukov  ;  II,  333).  In  his 
Confession  he  may  have  confused  dates. 


n^  I^OLSTOY 

Hence  Tolstoy  began  to  trace  the  paths  by  which  his 
every-day  companions  escaped  from  the  dilemma  that 
tortured  him: 

I  found  that  for  men  of  my  circle  there  are  four  ways  out 
from  the  awful  position  in  which  we  are  all  placed.  The  first 
way  out  is  that  of  ignorance.  It  consists  in  not  knowing,  not 
understanding  the  fact  that  life  is  evil  and  meaningless.  People 
of  this  class — mostly  women  or  very  young  or  very  stupid 
persons — have  not  yet  understood  the  question  of  life  that 
rose  before  Schopenhauer,  Solomon,  and  Buddha. — [Ch.  7.} 

The  second  way  out  is  through  Epicureanism.  Seeing 
that  life  is  evil  and  meaningless,  men  say:  "Let  us  eat, 
drink,  and  be  merry,  for  tomorrow  we  die.  Let  us  for- 
get the  fundamental  misery  of  life  in  its  fleeting  pleas- 
ures." Such  was  the  way  out  chosen  by  Solomon  and 
by  the  majority  of  Tolstoy's  associates.  And  such,  we 
may  add,  was  that  of  Omar  Khayyam: 

Then  to  the  Lip  of  this  poor  earthern  Urn 
I  lean'd,  the  Secret  of  my  Life  to  learn: 

And  Lip  to  Lip  it  murmur'd — "While  you  live. 
Drink! — for,  once  dead,  you  never  shall  return." 

Ah,  make  the  most  of  what  we  yet  may  spend. 
Before  we  too  into  the  Dust  descend; 

Dust  into  Dust,  and  under  Dust,  to  lie. 
Sans  Wine,  sans  Song,  sans  Singer,  and — sans  End! 

Tolstoy's  comment  is  decisive,  though  not  perfectly 
just:  "The  dulness  of  the  imagination  of  these  people 
gives  them  the  possibility  of  forgetting  that  which  gave 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      213 

no  peace  to  Buddha,  the  inevitabihty  of  disease,  old 
age,  and  death,  which  today  or  tomorrow  will  destroy 
all  these  pleasures.  .  . .  These  people  I  could  not  imitate; 
not  having  their  dulness  of  imagination,  I  could  not 
artificially  produce  it  in  myself." 

The  third  class  of  people  are  brave  and  honest:  seeing  ^ 
the  futility  of  life,  they  kill  themselves.     (It  must  be 
remembered  that  at  this  time  Tolstoy  had  no  faith  in  a 
life  after  death.)     "I  saw  that  this  was  the  most  worthy 
way  out,  and  I  wished  so  to  act." 

The  fourth  way  out  is  that  of  weakness.  It  consists  in  this, 
that,  understanding  the  evil  and  the  senselessness  of  life,  men 
continue  to  drag  it  on,  knowing  in  advance  that  nothing  can  come 
of  it.  .  .  .  This  is  the  way  out  characteristic  of  weakness,  for 
if  I  know  something  better,  and  it  is  in  my  power,  why  should  I 
not  give  myself  up  to  that  which  is  better.'*  ...  I  belonged  to 
that  class  of  people. — [Ch.  7.] 

Reason  had  convinced  Tolstoy  of  the  necessity  and 
duty  of  suicide,  and  yet  he  was  restrained  by  a  dim  con- 
sciousness of  a  mistake  in  his  reasoning;  by  a  certain 
consciousness  of  life  working  in  opposition  to  his  reason. 
This  new  force  suddenly  made  him  see  that  his  reason- 
ing had  been  based  exclusively  on  the  lives  of  wealthy, 
educated  men,  on  Buddha,  Schopenhauer,  and  his  own 
circle,  and  that  he  had  overlooked  the  immense  major- 
ity of  mankind,  the  real  working  class: 

I  felt  that  if  I  wished  to  live  and  to  understand  the  meaning 
of  life,  then  I  must  seek  this  meaning,  of  course,  not  among 


214  TOLSTOY 

those  who  had  lost  the  meaning  of  life  and  wished  to  kill  them- 
selves, but  among  those  billions  of  men  who  had  lived  and  who 
were  still  living,  who  worked  and  who  bore  upon  their  shoulders 
both  their  life  and  our  own.  And  I  glanced  at  the  immense 
masses  of  simple,  unlearned,  and  poor  people  who  had  lived 
and  were  still  living,  and  I  saw  something  quite  different.  I 
saw  that  all  these  billions  of  people  who  had  lived  and  were 
still  living,  all,  with  rare  exceptions,  failed  to  fit  into  my  classi- 
fication. I  could  not  admit  that  they  did  not  understand  the 
question,  because  they  put  it  themselves  and  answer  it  with 
extraordinary  clearness.  Neither  could  I  admit  that  they  were 
Epicureans,  because  their  life  is  composed  rather  of  priva- 
tions and  sufferings  than  of  enjoyments.  Still  less  could  I 
admit  that  they  irrationally  lived  to  the  end  of  a  meaningless 
life,  because  they  give  a  clear  explanation  to  every  act  of  their 
lives  and  to  death  itself.  And  to  kill  themselves  they  regard 
as  the  greatest  of  evils.  It  turned  out  thatfallhumanity  had  a 
sort  of  knowledge  of  the  meaning  of  life  which  I  failed  to 
recognize  and  which  I  despised.  The  result  was  that  rational 
knowledge  gave  no  meaning  to  life  and  excluded  life;  but  the 
meaning  given  to  life  by  billions  of  men,  by  all  humanity, 
rested  on  a  sort  of  contemptible  false  knowledge. 

Rational  knowledge  in  the  person  of  the  learned  and  the 
wise  denies  the  meaning  of  life,  but  the  immense  masses  at 
men,  all  humanity,  recognize  this  meaning  in  irrational  knowl- 
edge. And  that  irrational  knowledge  is  faith,  the  very  faith 
that  I  could  not  help  rejecting.  That  meant  God  in  one 
and  three;  it  meant  the  creation  in  six  days,  the  devils 
and  angels  and  all  that  which  I  could  not  accept  until  I  should 
go  mad. 

My  position  was  frightful.  I  knew  that  I  should  find  nothing 
on  the  path  of  rational  knowledge  except  the  denial  of  life. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      215 

and  in  faith  nothing  but  the  denial  of  reason,  which  is  still 
more  impossible  than  the  denial  of  life. — [Ch.  8.] 

Tolstoy's  next  step  was  to  see  that  his  original  ques- 
tion had  been  wrongly  put,  that  he  had  inquired  what 
was  the  extra-temporal,  extra-spatial,  extra-causal  mean- 
ing of  life,  and  that  he  had  received  the  answer  that  life 
had  no  temporal,  spatial,  or  casual  meaning.  The 
solution  to  his  problem  must  be  given  by  faith,  by  a 
faith  that  will  connect  man's  finite  hfe  with  an  infinite 
God.  Prepared  then  to  accept  any  faith  which  should 
not  directly  contradict  reason,  Tolstoy  now  turned  to 
the  study  of  religion;  he  studied  Buddhism  and  Moham- 
medanism from  books,  and  Christianity  both  from  books 
and  from  the  lives  of  the  people  around  him.  From 
cultivated  believers  he  could  learn  nothing:  their  faith 
was  not  real  faith,  but  merely  one  of  the  Epicurean 
solaces  of  life;  it  made  no  practical  difference  in  their  con- 
duct. But  the  faith  of  the  working  classes,  though  it  was 
outwardly  the  same  as  that  of  the  wealthy,  and  though 
it  was  blended  with  much  superstition,  was  intimately 
connected  with  their  daily  life,  was  in  fact  a  necessary 
condition  of  it.  It  made  them,  in  contrast  with  the 
upper  classes,  work  hard,  bear  privations  patiently, 
meet  death  without  terror  or  despair: 

And  I  came  to  love  these  people.  The  more  I  penetrated 
into  their  lives,  into  the  lives  of  those  still  living  and  into 
the  lives  of  those  who  had  died,  but  of  whom  I  had  read  and 
he^rd,  the  more  I  loved  them  and  the  easier  it  became  for 


216  TOLSTOY 

me  myself  to  live.  I  lived  thus  for  some  two  years,  and  in  me 
a  transformation  came  to  pass  that  had  long  been  preparing 
within  me  and  the  germs  of  which  had  always  been  in  me.  It 
came  to  pass  that  the  life  of  our  circle,  of  the  rich  and  the 
learned,  not  only  became  repugnant  to  me,  but  lost  all  meaning. 
All  our  acts,  our  reasonings,  our  sciences  and  arts — ^all  this  rose 
before  me  with  a  new  significance.  I  came  to  understand 
that  all  this  was  mere  pampering  of  the  appetites  and  that  it 
was  impossible  to  seek  meaning  in  it.  But  the  life  of  all  the 
toihng  folk,  of  all  humanity  which  was  creating  life,  rose 
before  me  in  its  true  significance.  I  came  to  understand  that 
this  is  life  itself,  and  that  the  meaning  given  to  this  life  is 
truth,  and  I  accepted  it. — [Ch.  10.] 

Thus  Tolstoy  returned  to  faith  not  through  any  pro- 
cess of  reasoning,  but  through  contact  with  the  masses 
of  the  people  and  through  the  infectiousness  of  their 
point  of  view. 

Having  rejected  reason  once,  Tolstoy  could  do  so 
many  times;  he  had  attained  the  sincerely  clerical  point 
of  view: 

But  with  this  meaning  of  the  popular  faith  there  is  in- 
separably connected  among  our  unsectarian  folk,  in  the  midst 
of  whom  I  Hved,  much  that  repelled  me  and  seemed  to  me  inex- 
plicable; the  sacraments,  the  church  services,  the  fasts,  the 
worship  of  relics  and  sacred  pictures.  The  people  cannot 
divide  one  from  the  other,  and  neither  could  I.  However 
strange  to  me  was  much  of  what  formed  part  of  the  popular 
faith,  I  accepted  it  all;  I  went  to  the  services,  prayed  in  the 
morning  and  in  the  evening,  fasted,  prepared  for  communion — 
and  at  first  my  reason  did  not  oppose  any  of  this.    The  very 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM     m 

thing  that  before  had  seemed  to  me  impossible  now  aroused* 
in  me  no  opposition. — [Ch.  13.] 

This  point  of  view  is  that  adopted  by  Levin  in  the  last 
chapter  of  Anna  Karenin,  when  he  reflects:  "I  am  willy- 
nilly  united  with  other  men  into  one  company  of  be- 
lievers, which  is  called  a  chm*ch." 

But  there  was  a  point  beyond  which  Tolstoy  could 
not  strain  his  reason;  the  reception  of  the  communion 
was  a  hard  task: 

I  shall  never  forget  the  feeling  of  torture  that  I  experienced 
on  the  day  when  I  took  the  communion  for  the  first  time 
after  many  years.  .  .  .  The  communion  itself  I  explained 
as  an  act  performed  in  memory  of  Christ  and  signifying  puri- 
fication from  sin  and  full  acceptance  of  the  teaching  of  Christ. 
Even  if  this  explanation  was  artificial,  I  did  not  notice  its 
artificiality.  It  was  so  joyous  for  me,  humiliating  and  abasing 
myself  before  the  confessor,  a  simple,  timid  priest,  to  turn  out 
all  the  filth  of  my  soul,  repenting  of  my  vices;  it  was  so  joyous 
to  merge  in  thought  with  the  humility  of  the  fathers,  who 
wrote  the  prayers  of  the  rules;  so  joyous  was  the  union  with 
all  who  have  believed  and  do  believe,  that  I  did  not  feel  the 
artificiality  of  my  explanation.  But  when  I  came  up  to  the 
royal  doors,  and  the  priest  made  me  repeat  what  I  believed, 
that  what  I  was  going  to  swallow  was  the  true  body  and  blood, 
then  I  was  cut  to  the  heart:  this  was  more  than  a  false  note; 
this  was  the  cruel  demand  of  some  one  who  evidently  had 
never  even  known  what  faith  is.  .  .  .  Knowing  in  advance 
what  awaited  me  I  could  not  go  there  a  second  time. 
—{Ch.  14.] 


218  TOLSTOY 

•  Yet  Tolstoy  was  finally  turned  away  from  the  churcli 
not  by  rational  objections  to  its  doctrines  but  by  moral 
objections  to  its  practices.  He  was  shocked  by  its  ex- 
clusiveness,  by  its  denunciation  of  Catholics,  Protes- 
tants, and  Russian  sectarians  and  dissenters  as  people 
living  in  spiritual  darkness.  This  was  indeed  opposed 
to  the  Christian  precept  of  brotherly  love.  On  the  pre- 
tence of  preserving  in  all  its  purity  the  Greco-Russian 
Orthodox  faith,  the  church  was  merely  seeking  the  best 
means  of  performing  in  the  sight  of  men  certain  human 
obligations  [the  sacraments].  Worse  than  this  was  the 
church's  attitude  towards  war,  and  in  particular  towards 
the  war  between  Russia  and  Turkey  of  1877-78;  and 
towards  capital  punishment,  and  in  particular  towards 
the  execution  of  certain  revolutionary  agitators  in  the 
times  immediately  following  this  war: 

At  that  time  war  occurred  in  Russia.  And  the  Russians 
began  in  the  name  of  Christian  love  to  kill  their  brothers. 
Not  to  think  of  this  was  impossible.  Not  to  see  that  murder 
is  an  evil  opposed  to  the  very  first  foundations  of  every  re- 
ligion was  impossible.  And  at  the  same  time  in  the  churches 
they  prayed  for  the  success  of  our  arms,  and  the  teachers  of 
religion  recognized  this  murder  as  an  act  resulting  from  re- 
ligion. And  not  only  these  murders  in  war — but  during  the 
disorders  that  followed  the  war  I  saw  officials  of  the  church, 
its  teachers,  monks  and  ascetics,  who  approved  the  murder  of 
erring  and  helpless  young  men.  And  I  turned  my  attention 
to  all  that  is  done  by  men  who  profess  Christianity,  and  I 
was  horrified. — [Ch.  15.] 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      219 

Thus  Tolstoy  became  convinced  that  in  the  faith 
which  he  had  accepted  false  elements  were  mingled  with 
truth.  In  1878,  after  three  years  of  faithful  adherence 
to  the  church,  he  abandoned  it  forever,  and  set  himself 
to  the  task  of  separating  the  central  elements  of  truth 
in  the  Christian  teaching  from  the  dirt  and  filth  with 
which  it  was  defiled  in  the  church's  presentation  of  it. 
This  he  sought  to  do  first  negatively,  by  the  examination 
and  criticism  of  a  manual  of  theology  recommended  by 
the  church,  and  second  positively,  by  a  similar  study 
of  the  Gospels,  which  he  felt  must  contain  the  essential 
teaching  of  Christ. 

Before  proceeding  to  an  examination  of  Tolstoy's  relig- 
ious and  ethical  system  as  he  developed  it  in  the  works 
that  sprang  immediately  from  his  conversion,  we  may 
pause  a  moment  to  consider  the  causes  of  that  conversion. 

Nothing  is  more  obvious  than  the  intimate  connec- 
tion of  the  conversion  with  the  concrete  facts  of  Tol- 
stoy's life.  His  whole  doctrine  he  derived  primarily 
from  his  own  experience,  and  only  secondarily  from  the 
study  of  other  thinkers.  His  conversion,  as  he  himself 
expounds  it,  sprang  from  his  own  dichotomy  of  the 
world  into  two  classes,  the  idle  and  sceptical  rich  and  the 
industrious  and  believing  poor.  These  two  classes  he 
represents  as  almost  mutually  exclusive.  But  such  a 
dichotomy  has  no  basis  in  reality,  not  even  in  Russian 
reality,  not  even  in  Russian  reahty  as  portrayed  by 
Tolstoy  in  his  works  of  art.  Idle  men  may  be  found 
among  the  poor,  and  industrious  men  among  the  rich. 


no  TOLSTOY 

even  in  Russia.  Tolstoy  is  blinded  to  this  fact  by  his 
refusal  to  regard  intellectual  work  as  anything  but 
Epicurean  relaxation,  or  at  best  as  a  pretence  at  real 
work,  a  mere  self-delusion.  Karenin  in  Tolstoy's  novel 
is  probably  busy  with  his  tasks,  if  we  average  all  the 
days  of  the  year,  more  hours  than  even  an  exceptionally 
industrious  peasant.  That  some  of  the  documents  that 
he  writes  lead  to  no  result  should  not  be  laid  up  against 
him;  even  so  some  of  the  peasant's  fields  may  be 
trampled  by  horses  or  ruined  by  droughts:  Karenin  and 
the  peasant  have  each  done  their  best.  Kitty  under- 
stands the  meaning  of  life  for  which  Levin  searches  in 
vain,*  yet  by  Tolstoy's  later  theory  she  belongs  in  the 
first  or  ignorant  class  rather  than  in  the  fifth,  of  the  true 
behevers.  Nor  even  at  this  period  can  Tolstoy  in  his 
more  discreet  moments  have  believed  in  the  universal 
power  of  faith  among  the  peasantry;  types  of  character 
such  as  he  pictured  later  in  The  Power  of  Darkness  can- 
not have  escaped  his  attention.  Tolstoy  has  seen  peas- 
ants such  as  Karatayev  and  rich  men  such  as  Anatole 
Kuragin  or  (not  to  be  unfair)  such  as  Vronsky,  and  from 
them  makes  a  viciously  simple  generalization.  Only  a 
year  or  two  later  he  has  shifted  his  point  of  view,  and 
proclaims  that,  far  from  the  church's  being  a  moral  in- 
spiration to  all  its  humble  followers,  any  peasant,  when 
once  the  moral  sentiment  is  awakened  within  him,  turns 
from  it  to  one  of  the  dissenting  bodies.f    To  establish  a 

*  Anna  Karenin:  part  v,  ch.  19. 

t  Critique  of  Dogmatic  Theology  (Conclusion):  see  p.  226. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      221 

dichotomy  like  Tolstoy's  as  a  basis  for  religious  life  in 
America  would  be  yet  more  futile. 

Tolstoy  is  not  disturbed  by  his  own  scepticism  with 
regard  to  God,  but  by  his  own  conviction  of  the  mean- 
inglessness  of  life.  The  existence  of  God,  Kant  has  satis- 
fied him,  cannot  be  proved  by  the  argument  from  cause; 
hence  the  pessimistic  outcome  of  all  reasoning  as  to  the 
causal,  temporal,  spatial  universe.  He  becomes  satis- 
fied of  the  existence  of  God  through  his  awakened  moral 
sense.  One  may  suspect  that  he  was  influenced  here — 
though  in  his  Confession  (ch.  12)  he  seems  to  imply  the 
contrary — by  Kant's  doctrine  of  the  immanent,  un- 
derived  moral  sense,  and  the  proof  of  God  from  it.  His 
divining  of  God's  existence  through  human  need  of  it 
is  valid  if  this  part  of  Kant's  doctrine  is  valid;  it  falls 
to  the  ground  with  it.  For  Kant's  reasoning  again  rests 
on  a  dichotomy  between  feeling  and  intellect  that  can- 
not be  accepted;  the  moral  sense  is  no  more  indepen- 
dent of  time,  space,  and  causaHty  than  is  the  intellect. 
Once  having  become  convinced  of  God's  existence,  Tol- 
stoy does  not  reason  upon  it,  for  reasoning,  he  feels, 
simply  removes  him  from  God.  Laying  aside  any  at- 
tempt at  theology,  and  paying  small  attention  to  meta- 
physics, he  devotes  his  energy  to  constructing  a  system 
of  practical  ethics,  and  to  applying  that  system  to  the 
solution  of  social  questions.  On  pragmatic  grounds  he 
may  be  justified  in  his  rejection  of  a  strictly  logical 
foundation  for  his  system.  Tolstoy's  system  can  be 
justified,  if  at  all,  only  by  the  contention  that  it  works 


222  TOLSTOY 

well  in  actual  practice:  it  is  not  a  strictly  logical  system 
of  philosophy,  nor  a  system  of  social  ethics,  developed 
by  observation  of  the  world  about  him,  but  a  religious 
system  of  personal  morality,  founded  on  man's  instinc- 
tive moral  sense  and  having  as  its  aim  the  guidance 
of  his  practical  life. 

On  the  development  of  this  rehgious  system  Tolstoy 
labored  with  whole-souled  devotion.  Beginning  work 
towards  the  close  of  1879,  by  the  end  of  1881  he  had  pro- 
duced his  Critique  of  Dogmatic  Theology  and  his  Harmony 
and  Translation  of  the  Four  Gospels.  In  his  preface  to 
the  Harmony  he  speaks  of  the  "concentrated,  continually 
ecstatic  spiritual  tension  that  I  experienced  in  the  course 
of  all  this  long  work."  A  tutor  in  his  household,  Vasily 
Ivanovich  Alekseyev,  a  former  revolutionist,  made  an 
abridgment  of  the  Harmony,  which,  with  some  revision 
by  Tolstoy  himself,  was  published  under  the  title,  A  Short 
Exposition  of  the  Gospel.  In  1883  Tolstoy  composed  a 
summary  of  his  creed,  in  half-autobiographical  form, 
to  which  he  gave  the  natne  My  Religion.  The  doctrine 
contained  in  these  books  forms  a  single  system,  that 
by  which  most  readers  the  world  over  have  judged 
Tolstoy's  thought.  They  too  often  forget  that  this 
system  is  not  consistent  either  with  Tolstoy's  view  of 
life  in  his  earlier  period,  when  he  wrote  his  great  novels, 
nor  with  some  of  his  teachings  in  his  latest  years,  after 
the  composition  of  My  Religion.  During  the  years  of 
storm  and  stress  which  we  have  just  reviewed,  in  the 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      223 

course  of  which  he  threw  off  his  former  caste  prejudices 
and  became  a  lover  of  all  humanity,  Tolstoy  developed  a 
system  of  thought  that  seemed  to  him  consistent  as  well 
as  convincing.  But  in  truth  it  still  contained  elements 
of  compromise.  As  he  grew  older  Tolstoy  became  more 
rigidly  consistent  in  his  point  of  view  and  rejected  posi- 
tions that  he  had  previously  maintained  with  stirring 
eloquence. 

The  Critique  of  Dogmatic  Theology  is  the  least  interest- 
ing of  all  Tolstoy's  writings.  Tolstoy  takes  a  manual 
of  dogmatic  theology  by  Makary,  Metropolitan  of  Mos- 
cow, and  proceeds  to  analyze  its  doctrines,  following  its 
arrangement  from  chapter  to  chapter.  He  is  thus  busy 
with  theology,  in  which  he  has  small  interest,  instead  of 
with  ethics,  on  which  he  writes  with  understanding  and 
fervor,  and  he  is  engaged  in  mere  destruction  instead  of 
in  building  up  a  system  of  his  own.  The  theology  of  the 
Russian  Orthodox  Church  differs  only  in  details  from 
that  of  the  Roman  Cathohcs  or  from  that  of  evangeHcal 
Protestants :  there  are  the  same  teachings  of  the  Trinity, 
the  miraculous  birth  of  Christ,  his  taking  upon  himself 
the  sins  of  the  world,  his  redemption  of  mankind  and 
resurrection,  and  of  salvation  by  faith  in  him.  Against 
all  this  Tolstoy  tilts  with  a  crusader's  fury.  He  will  make 
an  impression  upon  but  few  readers.  To  some  he  will 
seem  to  be  attacking  doctrines  that  have  utterly  lost 
their  hold  on  thinking  men,  and  which  should  be  passed 
over  with  silent  contempt  or  studied  as  relics  of  a  bygone 
stage  of  thought,  like  the  Homeric  theology;   to  others 


224  TOLSTOY 

he  will  seem  a  blasphemous  foe  of  a  great  church,  which 
preserves  intact  a  body  of  doctrine  that  needs  only- 
spiritual  interpretation  in  order  to  guide  men  today  as 
it  has  done  for  nearly  two  thousand  years.  In  the  ardor 
of  his  invective  one  misses  the  concrete  illustrations,  the 
shrewd  humor,  the  direct  connection  with  actual  life 
that  make  Tolstoy's  other  didactic  writings  so  powerful. 
But  in  his  Conclusion  Tolstoy  rises  to  sudden  eloquence: 

I  remember  when  I  did  not  yet  doubt  the  teaching  of  the 
church  and  was  reading  the  Gospel,  the  words:  *' Blasphemy 
against  the  Son  of  Man  shall  be  forgiven  you,  but  blasphemy 
against  the  Holy  Ghost  shall  not  be  forgiven,  neither  in  this 
world,  neither  in  the  world  to  come"* — I  could  in  no  way  un- 
derstand those  words. 

Now  they,  those  words,  are  too  terribly  clear  to  me.  Here 
it  is,  that  blasphemy  against  the  Holy  Ghost,  which  shall  not 
be  forgiven,  neither  in  this  world,  neither  in  the  world  to 
come. 

That  blasphemy  is  the  horrible  teaching  of  the  church,  the 
foundation  of  which  is  the  teaching  about  the  church. 

The  Orthodox  Church? 

I  can  now  connect  with  this  word  no  other  concept  than 
that  of  several  unshorn  men,  very  self-confident,  deluded, 
and  ill-educated,  in  silk  and  velvet,  with  diamond  panagias, 
called  bishops  and  metropolitans,  and  thousands  of  other  un- 
shorn men,  who  are  in  the  most  crude,  slavish  servility  to  these 
dozens  of  men,  and  who  are  occupied,  under  the  pretext  of 
performing  certain  sacraments,  in  cheating  and  fleecing  the 
people.  How  can  I  believe  in  this  church,  and  believe  in  it 
*  Loosely  quoted  from  Matthew  xii,  31,  32. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      225 

when  to  the  deepest  questions  of  man  about  his  soul  it  replies 
with  pitiable  deceptions  and  stupidities,  and  moreover  main- 
tains that  no  one  must  dare  reply  otherwise  to  those  questions, 
that  in  all  that  forms  the  most  precious  part  of  my  life  I  must 
not  dare  be  guided  by  anything  else  than  by  what  it  points 
out?  The  color  of  my  trousers  I  may  choose,  my  wife  I  may 
choose  according  to  my  taste,  but  as  to  the  rest,  the  very 
thing  in  which  I  feel  myself  a  man,  as  to  all  that  I  must  take 
counsel  of  them,  of  those  idle,  deceiving  and  ignorant  men. 
In  my  life,  in  the  sanctuary  of  my  soul,  my  guide  is  a  pastor, 
my  parish  priest,  a  befooled,  illiterate  lad  discharged  from 
the  seminary,  or  a  drunken  old  man  whose  only  care  is  to 
gather  in  as  many  eggs  and  kopeks  as  he  can.  They  bid  that 
in  prayer  the  deacon  should  half  the  time  shout  "many  years'* 
for  the  orthodox,  pious  harlot  Catherine  II,  or  for  the  most 
pious  Peter,  the  robber  and  murderer,  who  mocked  at  the 
Gospel,  and  I  must  pray  thus.  They  bid  me  curse  and  bum 
and  hang  my  brothers,  and  I  must  follow  their  example  in 
shouting  anathema.  These  people  bid  me  regard  my  brothers 
as  accursed,  and  I  must  shout  anathema.  They  bid  me  come 
drink  wine  from  a  spoon  and  swear  that  it  is  not  wine  but  the 
body  and  the  blood,  and  I  must  do  so. 

But  this  is  horrible! 

It  would  be  horrible  if  it  were  possible.  But  in  fact  it  does 
not  occur,  but  not  because  they  have  weakened  in  their  de- 
mands: they  still  yell  anathema  at  whom  they  are  bidden  to, 
and  "many  years"  at  whom  they  are  likewise  bidden  to — but 
in  fact  for  a  long,  long  time  nobody  has  been  heeding  them. 

We,  experienced  and  educated  people  (I  remember  my  thirty 
years  outside  the  faith),  do  not  even  despise  them;  we  simply 
pay  no  attention  to  them,  do  not  even  have  the  curiosity  to 
know  what  they  are  doing  and  writing  and  saying.    A  priest 


220  TOLSTOY 

has  come — give  him  half  a  ruble.  A  church  has  been  built  for 
vanity's  sake — consecrate  it,  call  in  a  long-maned  arch-priest, 
and  give  him  a  hundred.  The  common  people  pay  still  less 
attention  to  them.  In  the  week  before  Lent  we  must  eat 
pancakes,  and  in  Passion  Week  prepare  for  Communion;  but 
if  a  question  of  the  soul  arises  for  us  we  resort  to  wise  and 
learned  thinkers,  to  their  books,  or  to  the  lives  of  the  saints, 
but  not  to  the  priests;  and  the  men  of  the  people,  as  soon  as 
religious  feeling  is  awakened  within  them,  join  the  dissenters, 
the  Stundists,  or  the  Molokane.  So  that  the  priests  have 
long  since  been  performing  the  service  for  themselves,  and  for 
feeble-minded  folk,  rascals,  and  women.  Evidently  they  will 
soon  be  instructing  in  life  only  one  another. 

One  can  understand  that  the  Russian  Church,  once 
Tolstoy's  teaching  had  become  famous,  could  hardly 
do  otherwise  than  publicly  proclaim  him  no  longer  a 
member  of  its  flock.  It  is  a  wonder  that  it  took  that 
action  only  in  1901. 

This  book  was  the  last  which  the  Countess  Tolstoy 
copied  for  her  husband.*  Her  influence  was  always 
exerted  towards  modifying  his  more  drastic  expressions, 
and  in  the  first  edition  of  the  Critique  the  final  para- 
graphs quoted  above  do  not  appear;  they  are  printed 
in  the  edition  published  by  Chertkov  in  England  in  1903. 
Beginning  with  the  Confession^  nearly  all  of  Tolstoy's 
religious  and  moral  writings  were  prohibited  in  Russia 
by  the  censorship,  and  were  issued  in  Switzerland, 
England,  and  Germany. 

*  Ksyunin,  The  Departure  of  Tolstoy  (St,  Petersburg,  1911),  p.  38, 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM     227 

From  the  Critique  one  turns  with  a  certain  relief  to 
the  Harmony  and  Translation  of  the  Four  Gospels.  Now 
that  he  has  refuted  the  false  doctrines  of  the  church, 
Tolstoy  seeks  to  learn  in  what  the  true  teaching  of  Jesus 
consists.  He  studies  the  Greek  text  of  the  Gospels  in 
the  spirit  of  a  Protestant  theologian,  making  a  revised 
translation,  seeking  to  explain  inconsistencies,  and  cast- 
ing aside  as  interpolations  passages  that  contradict  the 
spirit  of  Christ.  The  Greek  text,  the  Russian  accepted 
version,  and  Tolstoy's  own  rendering  are  printed  in 
parallel  columns,  after  which  follows  Tolstoy's  commen- 
tary, with  frequent  quotations  from  other  interpreters 
and  refutation  of  them. 

Tolstoy's  attitude  towards  the  Gospels  is  logically 
indefensible.  His  doctrine  of  the  deity  is  so  vague  that 
he  cannot  be  regarded  as  believing  in  a  personal  God. 
Later,  in  his  Journal  for  July,  1896,  he  wrote  directly: 
"I  even  know  as  a  matter  of  fact  that  He  is  not  personal, 
because  the  personal  is  finite  and  God  is  infinite."  * 
Towards  Christ  he  takes  a  position  like  that  of  Unita- 
rians or  agnostics :  Christ  was  for  him  a  man  like  other 
men,  a  great  teacher  of  religion.  He  never  says  directly 
that  Jesus  was  inspired  or  infallible,  and  yet  he  assumes 
for  his  teaching  an  infallibility  that  he  does  not  assert. 
When  he  has  once  determined  to  his  own  satisfaction 
the  original  teaching  of  Jesus,  he  accepts  it  with  reverent 
faith.    Taking  as  his  foundation  the  simplest  and  most 

*  The  Journal  of  Leo  Tolstoy,  1895-1899,  translated  by  Stninsky 
(New  York,  1917) :  p.  67. 


^^8  TOLSTOY 

intelligible  portions  of  the  text,  he  interprets  the  rest 
in  accord  with  them.  Passages  that  seem  to  him  false 
or  hopelessly  obscure  he  either  rejects  as  interpolations 
or  boldly  alters,  sometimes,  though  not  always,  fortify- 
ing himself  by  the  comparison  of  manuscripts  or  by 
the  use  of  the  lexicon.  All  the  miracles,  including  the 
crowning  miracle  of  the  resurrection,  he  casts  aside  as 
useless  and  injurious  to  the  correct  understanding  of  the 
teaching.  The  falsity  of  the  story  of  the  resurrection, 
he  tells  us,  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  the  narrators  could 
not  make  Christ  say  anything  worth  while  after  he  rose 
from  the  dead.  The  truth  of  the  narrative  of  his  life 
is  attested  by  the  words  of  his  message.*  This  is  the 
Protestant  attitude  run  mad,  individual  liberty  of  in- 
terpretation carried  to  its  farthest  extreme,  while  still 
the  dogma  of  infaUibility  lurks  in  the  background.  A 
scientific  critic  will  seek  to  determine  the  real  teaching 
of  the  Gospels,  feeling  at  liberty  to  reject  it  when  he 
has  found  it.  In  contrast  to  this,  Tolstoy's  method  re- 
sults in  the  development  of  his  own  thought  rather 
than  in  the  discovery  of  the  true  teaching  of  Jesus. 

The  origin  of  Tolstoy's  attitude  is  obvious.  Certain 
parts  of  the  Gospels  have  appealed  to  him  from  his 
childhood,  as  utterances  of  the  deepest  truth,  corre- 
sponding to  his  own  heartfelt  demands.  Confronted  by 
the  soul  problem  before  him,  he  feels  that  thorough  study 
of  the  book  containing  these  utterances  will  yield  him 
fuller  comprehension  of  them.     But  he  fails  to  see  that 

*  Harmony,  ch.  12. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      229 

his  study  is  really  throwing  light  on  his  own  system, 
and  only  secondarily  on  that  of  the  Gospels.  From 
one  point  of  view  his  book  is  the  product  of  misdirected 
energy;  from  another  it  is  a  monument  of  keen  intel- 
lectual labor,  in  which  we  see  the  processes  that  led  to 
the  building  of  a  great  religious  classic  in  My  Religion, 

Two  examples  of  Tolstoy's  methods  of  interpretation 
must  suffice.  Tolstoy's  fundamental  problem,  as  stated 
in  his  Confession^  has  been  to  find  an  explanation  of  the 
riddle  of  life;  some  faith  that  will  give  a  meaning  to  his 
futile  existence.  The  author  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  has 
understood  his  difficulty.  For  the  opening  words  of 
that  Gospel:  "In  the  beginning  was  the  Word,  and  the 
Word  was  with  God,  and  the  Word  was  God.  The  same 
was  in  the  beginning  with  God" — become  in  Tolstoy's 
version:  "The  understanding  of  life  became  the  be- 
ginning [or,  first  principle]  of  all.  And  the  understanding 
of  life  took  the  place  of  God.  And  this  understand- 
ing of  life  became  God.  It  became  the  beginning  of  all 
in  place  of  God."  God  is  a  concept  infinitely  above 
man's  comprehension,  and  is  replaced  for  him  by  a  true 
knowledge  of  life.  Surely  the  unhistorical  and  personal 
interpretation  of  scripture  can  go  no  farther  than  this! 
Biblical  scholars  may  have  a  right  to  scornful  laughter. 
And  yet  there  is  something  winning  and  pathetic,  even 
inspiring,  in  Tolstoy's  struggles  with  a  mystic  text 
which  he  forces  to  correspond  with  his  own  spiritual 
history. 

Jesus  said  to  men,  "Love  your  enemies,"  'Ayairdre  rovg 


230  TOLSTOY 

exOpovg  vfiwv.    In  Greek  there  are  two  words  for  en- 
emy, one  meaning  a  public  foe  and  the  other  a  per- 
sonal enemy;    the  latter  is   used  in  this  case.    The 
saying  has  been  generally  interpreted  as  a  command  to 
have  no  hostile  feelings,  to  love  men  who  do  evil  to  us. 
But  the  literal-minded  Tolstoy  exclaims  (in  My  Religion, 
ch.  6):    "To  love  one's  enemies?    This  was  something 
impossible.    This  was  one  of  those  fine  sayings  which 
cannot  be  regarded  otherwise  than  as  an  indication  of 
an  unattainable  moral  ideal.    This  was  either  too  much 
or  nothing  at  all.     It  is  possible  not  to  injure  one's 
enemy,  but  to  love  him  is  impossible."    Christ  could  not 
have  prescribed  the  impossible.    The  escape  is  obvious; 
the  enemy  meant  in  the  text  is  a  public  enemy,  a  man 
of  another  race.     One  should  love  all  men  alike,  making 
no  difference  between  Russians  and  French,  English,  or 
Germans.    To  such  an  ideal  Tolstoy  felt  that  he  might 
attain;    hence  he  made  no  comment  on  the  philological 
objections    to     his  interpretation.      Characteristically 
enough,  Tolstoy  abandoned  this  position  with  advancing 
years.     In  March,  1891,  he  wrote  in  a  private  letter 
(to  Rakhmanov):    "Do  not  think  that  I  defend  my 
former  point  of  view,  expressed  in  My  Religion.    I  not 
only  do  not  defend  it,  but  I  rejoice  that  we  have  out- 
lived it."*    He  now  tells  us  that  one  element  of  per- 
fection is  to  have  no  enemies — the  conventional  inter- 
pretation of  the  passage — and  doing  good  to  one's  enemies 
is  one  stage  of  progress  towards  it. 

*l,eUers  collected  by  Sergeyenko  (Moscow,  1910)  :  vol.  I,  p.  200, 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      231 

Similarly  Tolstoy  came  to  see  that  the  truth  of  his 
own  doctrine  was  in  no  way  dependent  on  the  historical 
existence  of  Jesus.  As  early  as  1882  he  wrote:  "It  now 
seems  to  me  that  if  Christ  and  his  teaching  had  never 
existed,  I  should  myself  have  discovered  this  truth,  so 
clear  and  simple  does  it  now  appear  to  me."*  He  wrote 
to  Biryukov,  in  1899,  [that  the  supposition  that  Christ 
never  existed  was  "like  the  destruction  of  the  last 
outskirts  opposed  to  the  enemies'  attack,  in  order  that 
the  fortress  (the  moral  teaching  of  goodness,  which 
flows,  not  from  any  one  source  in  time  or  space,  but 
from  the  whole  spiritual  life  of  humanity  in  its  entirety) 
may  remain  impregnable."t  ^^  1909  he  speaks  with 
assurance; 

The  teaching  of  Jesus  is  for  me  only  one  of  the  beautiful 
religious  teachings  that  we  have  received  from  Egyptian, 
Jewish,  Hindu,  Chinese,  and  Greek  antiquity.  The  two  great 
principles  of  Jesus :  the  love  of  God,  that  is  to  say  of  absolute 
perfection;  and  the  love  of  one's  neighbor,  that  is  to  say  of  all 
men  without  any  distinction  whatever,  have  been  preached 
by  all  the  sages  of  the  world:  Krishna,  Buddha,  Lao-tsze, 
Confucius,  Socrates,  Plato,  Epictetus,  Marcus  Aurelius, 
and,  among  the  moderns,  Rousseau,  Pascal,  Kant,  Emerson, 
Channing,  and  many  others.  Religious  and  moral  truth  is 
always  and  everywhere  the  same.  ...  I  have  no  predilec- 
tion for  Christianity.  If  I  have  been  particularly  interested 
by  the  teachings  of  Jesus,  it  is  because,  first,  I  was  born  and 

*  Letter  to  N.  N.:  On  Non-Resistance  to  Evil  by  Evil. 
t  Maude:  Tolstoy  and  Uis  Problems,  p.  209;  cf.  Journal,  tr.  Strun- 
sky,  p.  38? . 


232  TOLSTOY 

have  lived  among  Christians;  and,  second,  I  have  found 
great  spiritual  joy  in  separating  the  pure  teaching  from  the 
surprising  falsifications  made  by  the  churches.* 

In  My  Religion  Tolstoy  gives  the  results  of  his  study 
of  the  Gospels  in  short,  pithy  form,  with  personal  illus- 
trations that  show  the  novelist's  power.  The  system 
that  he  develops  is  simple  on  the  side  of  theology,  and 
almost  equally  so  on  that  of  ethics. 

Tolstoy's  theology  may  be  dismissed  briefly.  God 
Tolstoy  never  seeks  to  define;  God  exists,  but  is  un- 
knowable except  as  the  source  of  faith.  More  positive  is 
Tolstoy's  attitude  on  the  second  great  dogma  of  Chris- 
tianity, one  held  so  universally  that  it  is  felt  by  many 
to  be  synonymous  with  faith  of  any  sort,  the  belief  in 
immortality.  This  Tolstoy  directly  and  emphatically 
repudiates: 

The  idea  of  a  future  personal  life  came  to  us  not  from  the 
Hebrew  teaching  and  not  from  the  teaching  of  Christ.  It  en- 
tered into  the  church  teaching  from  absolutely  different 
sources.  However  strange  it  may  appear,  it  is  impossible  not 
to  say  that  the  belief  in  a  future  life  is  a  very  low  and  crude 
conception,  founded  on  a  confusion  of  sleep  with  death, 
and  peculiar  to  all  savage  peoples,  and  that  the  Hebrew 
teaching,  not  to  speak  of  the  Christian,  stood  immeasurably 
above  it.  We  are  so  convinced  that  this  superstition  is  some- 
thing very  elevated,  that  with  great  seriousness  we  try  to  prove 
the  superiority  of  our  teaching  over  others  by  the  very  fact 

*  Quoted  by  Rolland  (ch.  10)  from  a  letter  to  the  painter  Jan 
Styka,  printed  in  Le  Theosophe,  Jan.  16,  1911. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM     233 

that  we  hold  this  superstition,  while  others,  like  the  Chinese 
and  the  Indians,  do  not  hold  it. — [My  Religion,  eh.  8.] 


The  true  eternal  Kfe  is  that  which  each  man  receives 
through  the  understanding  of  life  which  is  the  beginning 
of  all.  "Christ  contrasts  with  the  personal  life  not  the 
life  beyond  the  grave,  but  the  general  life,  connected 
with  the  present,  past,  and  future  life  of  all  humanity — 
the  hfe  of  the  Son  of  Man."*  "All  the  teaching  of  Jesus 
consists  in  this,  that  his  disciples,  understanding  the 
phantasmal  quality  of  the  personal  life,  should  renounce 
it  and  transfer  it  into  the  life  of  all  humanity,  into  the 
life  of  the  Son  of  Man.  But  the  teaching  of  the  immor- 
tality of  the  personal  soul  not  only  does  not  summon 
one  to  renounce  his  personal  life,  but  forever  confirms 
this  personality."*  "  To  all  men  is  given  the  possibility 
of  true  life.  He  who  wishes  takes  it;  he  who  does  not 
wish  does  not  take  it.  He  who  receives  true  life  has  it; 
and  it  is  not  exactly  the  same  for  all,  but  to  it  there  can- 
not be  applied  our  concepts  greater  and  smaller,  earlier 
and  later.  It  is  outside  the  categories  of  space,  time, 
and  causality,  they  would  say  in  philosophic  language."  f 
"The  Kingdom  of  Heaven  is  outside  time  and  space;  it 
is  within  you,  in  your  present  life."t  For  this  life 
death  has  no  meaning;  it  cannot  be  destroyed  by  carnal 
death.  "For  God  there  is  no  time;  and  therefore, 
uniting  with  God,  man  escapes  from  time,  consequently 
from  death."  t 

*My  Religion^  ch.  8.  f  Harmony,  ch.  8.  J  Ibid.,  ch.  9. 


^S4  TOLSTOY 

One  may  surmise  that  Tolstoy,  unable  to  accept  the 
popular  doctrine  of  the  future  life,  which  he  cannot 
justify  by  reason,  builds  up  his  own  view  on  the  basis 
of  Kant's  conception  that  the  moral  principle  is  inde- 
pendent of  space  and  time.    This  view  he  later  elabo- 
rated in  his  most  important  metaphysical  book.  On  Life 
(1887),  in  which  he  strives  to  show  the  extra-spatial  and 
extra-temporal    nature    of    the    regenerate    life.     His 
reasoning  is  not  such  as  would  be  accepted  by  a  Kantian; 
into  it  he  blends  elements  that  he  probably  derived  from 
Plato.*    His  leading  thought  is  of  the  dual  nature  of 
human  life,  which  is  divided  into  animal,  carnal,  per- 
sonal life  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  life  of  reason  on  the 
other.    The  carnal,  personal  existence  is  not  real  life 
{On  Lifcy  ch.  8).     "True  Kfe  man  knows  within  himself 
as  a  striving  for  the  good,  attainable  by  the  subjection 
of  his  animal  personahty  to  the  law  of  reason"  (ch.  14). 
"Reason  itself  cannot  be  defined,  and  we  have  no  need 
to  define   it,  because  we  not  only  know  it,  but  know 
nothing  but  reason"  (ch.  10);   that  is,  the  foundation 
of  the  moral  life  is  immediate,  inborn  knowledge.    This 
rational  life  "is  manifested  in  time  and  space,  but  is 
defined  not  by  temporal  and  spatial  conditions,  but  only 
by  the  degree  of  subjection  of  the  animal  personality 
to  reason.    To  define  life  by  temporal  and  spatial  con- 
ditions is  like  defining  the  height  of  an  object  by  its 

*The  problem  of  Tolstoy's  indebtedness  to  formal  philosophy  is 
important,  and  has  not,  so  far  as  the  writer  knows,  been  discussed 
with  any  thoroughness.  This  book  can  do  no  more  than  indicate  its 
existence. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      235 

length  and  breadth*'  (ch.  14).     "The  renunciation  of 

the  good  of  personaHty  is the  indispensable  condition 

of  the  life  of  man"  (ch.  15).  Yet  personaHty  itself  for  a 
rational  man  is  the  indispensable  condition  of  life. 
"One  should  not  renounce  personality,  but  renounce 
the  good  of  personality  and  cease  to  recognize  personal- 
ity as  life"  (ch.  21).  No  man's  life  vanishes  through 
his  corporeal  death;  it  lives  on  in  the  memory  of  him,  in 
his  influence  on  other  men.  "My  special  relation  to 
the  world  was  established  not  in  this  life  and  began  not 
with  my  body  and  not  with  a  series  of  stages  of  conscious- 
ness in  time  "  (ch.  28) .  "  Christ  died  very  long  ago,  and  his 
carnal  existence  was  short,  and  we  have  no  clear  idea  of  his 
carnal  personaHty,  but  the  force  of  his  rationally-loving 
life,  his  relation  to  the  world — no  one  else's — acts  till  this 
very  time  on  milHons  of  men  who  receive  into  themselves 
this  relation  of  his  to  the  world  and  live  by  it"  (ch.  31). 
This  true  meaning  of  Hfe  Tolstoy  defends  against  the 
Pharisees  and  the  Scribes,  that  is,  against  churchmen 
and  materialistic  scientists.    The  former 

profess  in  words  the  teachings  of  those  enlighteners  of  hu- 
manity, in  whose  traditions  they  were  educated;  but,  not 
understanding  their  rational  sense,  they  turn  these  teachings 
into  supernatural  revelations  of  the  past  and  future  life  of  men 
and  require  only  the  performance  of  ceremonies.  This  is  the 
teaching  of  the  Pharisees  in  the  broadest  sense  of  the  term, 
that  is,  of  men  who  teach  that  a  Hfe  in  itself  irrational  may  be 
set  right  by  faith  in  another  life,  acquired  by  performance  of 
external  ceremonies. 


2S6  TOLSTOY 

Others,  not  recognizing  the  possibility  of  any  other  life  than 
the  visible  life,  deny  all  marvels  and  all  that  is  supernatural 
and  boldly  maintain  that  the  life  of  man  is  naught  else  than 
his  bodily  existence  from  birth  to  death.  This  is  the  teach- 
ing of  the  Scribes,  of  men  who  teach  that  in  the  life  of 
man  as  an  animal  there  is  nothing  irrational. — [On  Life, 
ch.  2.] 

Tolstoy's  rejection  of  personal  immortality .  was  a 
passing  phase  of  his  thought,  though  a  very  important 
one.  Before  his  religious  conversion  he  had  at  least 
a  flickering  belief  in  it.  In  1859  he  had  written  to  his 
cousin  that  during  his  life  in  the  Caucasus  (1851-53)  he 
had  "found  out  that  immortality  exists,  that  love  exists, 
and  that  one  must  live  for  others  in  order  to  be  eternally 
happy."*  In  1865  he  had  again  written  to  her:  "I 
now  know  that  I  have  a  soul  that  is  immortal  (at  least 
I  often  think  that  I  know  it),  and  I  know  that  God 
exists."  t  And  in  his  latest  years  he  seems  to  have  come 
to  a  firm  faith  in  it.  Passages  in  his  Journal,  from 
November,  1897,  to  February,  1898,  show,  to  be  sure, 
that  he  had  not  yet  attained  such  a  faith.  J  But  in  May, 
1898,  he  wrote  to  his  wife: 

I  rode  home  through  Turgenev's  wood.  .  .  .  And  I  thought, 
as  I  think  continually,  of  death.  And  it  became  so  clear 
to  me  that  it  will  be  just  as  good,  though  in  a  different  way, 

*  Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  p.  131;  compare  p. 
16,  above. 

t  Ibid.,  p.  210. 

t  The  Journal  of  Leo  Tolstoy,  1895-1899,  translated  by  Striuisky 
(New  York,  1917):  pp.  168,  189,  205. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      237 

on  the  other  side  of  death,  and  I  could  understand  why  the 
Jews  represented  paradise  as  a  garden.  The  purest  joy  is 
the  joy  of  nature.  It  was  clear  to  me  that  there  it  will  be 
just  as  good — no,  better.  I  tried  to  call  forth  in  myself  doubt  of 
the  other  life,  such  as  I  used  to  have,  and  I  could  not  as  I 
could  before,  but  I  could  call  forth  confidence  within  me. — 
[Letters  to  Wife,  p.  545.] 

And  in  his  Course  of  Readingy  which  he  compiled  in  the 
last  years  of  his  life,  he  writes  boldly:  "Only  he  can 
disbelieve  in  immortality  who  has  never  seriously  thought 
of  death."* 

The  vital  part  of  Tolstoy's  teaching  is,  however,  not 
his  theology  or  his  metaphysics,  but  his  ethics.  Reading 
the  Gospels,  he  discovered  that  the  central  doctrine  of 
Christ  was  contained  in  the  precept:  "I  say  unto  you. 
That  ye  resist  not  evil "  (Matthew  v,  39) .  When  he  read 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  with  a  Jewish  rabbi,  the  rabjbi 
could  cite  for  all  sayings  of  Jesus  parallels  in  the  Old 
Testament  or  in  the  Talmud.  "But  when  we  came  to 
the  verse  about  non-resistance  to  evil,  he  did  not  say, 
'This  is  also  in  the  Talmud,'  but  only  asked  me  with  a 
sneer:  *And  do  the  Christians  observe  this.?  Do  they 
turn  the  other  cheek .f^'  I  had  nothing  to  reply, 
the  more  so  since  I  knew  that  at  this  very  time  the 
Christians  were  not  only  not  turning  the  cheek,  but 
beating  the  Jews  on  the  cheek  turned  towards 
them."t 

This  rejected  teaching  Tolstoy  made  the  corner-stone 
*  Course  of  Reading  (Moscow,  1910) :  1, 117.      f  My  Religion,  ch.  2. 


^38  TOLSTOY 

of  his  edifice.    Starting  from  it,  he  reduced  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount  to  five  commandments : 

1.  Be  not  angry.  Live  in  peace  with  all  men;  never 
regard  your  anger  at  men  as  just. 

2.  Do  not  make  for  yourself  a  sport  of  the  lust  of 
sex  relations:  let  every  man  have  a  wife,  and  the  wife 
a  husband;  and  let  the  husband  have  one  wife,  and  the 
wife  one  husband.  And  under  no  pretext  must  they 
violate  the  carnal  union  with  each  other. 

3.  Swear  not  at  all.  Never  take  oath  to  any  man  in 
any  matter.     Every  oath  is  required  from  men  for  evil. 

4.  Resist  not  evil  by  force.  Do  not  reply  to  violence 
by  violence:  if  they  strike  you,  endure  it;  if  they  force 
you  to  work,  work;  if  they  wish  to  take  from  you  what 
we  regard  as  our  own,  give  it  up. 

5.  Love  all  men  alike,  making  no  distinction  of  races 
and  peoples;   recognize  neither  kings  nor  kingdoms. 

Of  these  commandments  the  first  pertains  to  man 
alone  with  himself  in  his  heart;  the  second  to  his  rela- 
tions with  woman,  to  the  family;  the  third  to  man  in 
his  private  worldly  relations  with  other  men;  the  fourth 
to  the  relations  of  man  to  his  own  state  and  its  laws; 
the  fifth  to  his  relations  with  all  humanity,  to  men  of 
other  nations.* 

In  these  rules  there  is  not  at  first  sight  anything 
startling;  they  are  much  like  what  each  of  us  has  learned 
at  his  mother's  knee.  The  trouble  comes  in  Tolstoy's 
drastic  application  of  these  principles,  which  he  clearly 

*  My  Religion,  ch.  6;  Harmony ^  ch.  4. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      239 

sees  will  destroy  all  human  society  as  at  present  or- 
ganized. A  man  who  will  take  no  oaths,  that  is,  who 
will  not  submit  his  will  to  that  of  another,  who  will 
not  resist  evil  by  force,  and  who  loves  all  nations  equal- 
ly, can  obviously  take  no  part  in  war,  whether  as  officer 
or  private.  Just  as  obviously,  he  can  take  no  part  in 
the  state  administration,  as  judge  or  member  of  a  jury. 
Furthermore,  he  can  hold  no  property,  since  force  is 
required  to  defend  this  from  others: 

This  faith  has  changed  my  estimate  of  what  is  good  and 
what  is  bad  and  low.  All  that  formerly  seemed  to  me  good 
and  high — ^riches,  property  of  every  sort,  honor,  the  con- 
sciousness of  one's  own  dignity  and  rights — ^all  this  now  has 
become  bad  and  low;  and  all  that  seemed  to  me  bad  and  low — 
work  for  others,  poverty,  humiliation,  renunciation  of  all 
property  and  all  rights — has  become  good  and  high  in  my  eyes. 
If  now  in  a  moment  of  forgetfulness  I  may  be  so  far  carried 
away  as  to  use  violence  for  the  defense  of  myself  or  others  or 
of  my  own  property  or  that  of  others,  I  can  no  longer  calmly 
and  consciously  serve  that  temptation,  which  destroys  my- 
self and  other  men.  I  cannot  acquire  property;  I  cannot  use 
violence  of  any  sort  against  any  manner  of  man,  with  the 
exception  of  a  child,  and  then  only  to  save  him  from  some 
evil  that  hangs  over  him;  I  cannot  take  part  in  any  activity 
of  the  authorities  having  as  its  aim  the  defense  of  men  and  their 
property  by  violence;  I  can  be  neither  a  judge  nor  one  sharing 
in  court  duties;  I  cannot  be  an  executive  or  one  sharing  in  an 
executive  position;  I  cannot  contribute  to  having  others 
take  part  in  courts  and  executive  positions. — [My  Religion^  ch. 
U.] 


240  TOLSTOY 

Under  Tolstoy's  system  a  faithful  Christian  must 
become  a  beggar,  a  pious  mendicant.  Tolstoy  sees  this 
consequence  with  perfect  clearness,  stating  in  his  Har- 
mony (ch.  4)  that  "only  the  beggar  and  the  wanderer 
can  enter  into  the  Kingdom  of  God."  This  conclusion 
was  in  accord  with  the  whole  tendency  of  his  religious 
thought.  We  have  already  noted  in  his  first  work. 
Childhood,  his  admiration  for  the  half-witted  pilgrim 
Grisha.*  In  a  letter  to  Strakhov  of  1877  he  writes: 
"If  I  were  alone,  I  should  not  be  a  monk,  I  should  be  a 
pious  mendicant;  that  is,  I  should  prize  nothing  in  life 
and  should  do  no  one  harm.^f  In  his  posthumous 
drama.  The  Light  Shineth  in  Darkness,  written  in  1900- 
02,  he  makes  his  double  Saryntsov  exclaim,  near  the 
close  of  the  play:  "Humihty,  pious  mendicancy.  Yes, 
if  I  could  only  rise  to  it !"  And  his  final  flight  from  home, 
at  the  age  of  eighty-two,  was  beyond  doubt  an  attempt 
to  realize  this  ideal. 

In  My  Religion  Tolstoy  makes  prominent  this  ideal 
of  pious  mendicancy,  the  same  that  inspired  the  friars 
of  medieval  times.  But  here,  since  he  is  no  longer  lay- 
ing down  abstract  principles,  as  in  the  Harmony ,  but  a 
practical  guide  for  daily  life,  he  involuntarily  introduces 
elements  of  compromise,  pronouncing  "work,  physical 
work  that  gives  appetite  and  sound,  refreshing  sleep," 
and  the  family,  to  be  "undoubted  conditions"  of  human 
happiness. t  The  same  point  of  view,  as  we  shall  see 
later,  will  be  emphasized  in  What  Shall  We  Do  Then? 
*  Page  29,  above.       f  Biryukov:  II,  304.     %  My  Religion,  ch.  10. 


^ 


M. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM     241 

(1886).  Now  work  is  not  the  most  prominent  charac- 
teristic of  pious  mendicants,  and  family  Ufe  is  incon- 
sistent with  their  aims.  The  family  ideal,  one  may  say, 
represents  a  survival,  a  dearly  loved  survival,  of  Tol- 
stoy's worldly  period,  which  at  last  he  will  be  obliged 
to  cast  aside  as  inconsistent  with  his  ascetic  system. 

Thus  the  wealthy  aristocrat  Tolstoy  has  developed 
on  the  basis  of  the  Gospels  a  system  of  ethics  that  is 
thoroughly  anarchistic,  destructive  of  all  organized 
society.  Regarding  Christianity  as  fundamentally  a 
simple  code  of  moral  rules,  he  pours  out  his  scorn  upon 
St.  Paul,  the  first  corrupter  of  Christianity,  "who  did 
not  know  the  ethical  teaching  expressed  in  the  Gospel 
of  Matthew,  and  who  preached  a  metaphysico-cabaHstic 
theory  foreign  to  Christ."  The  process  of  degeneration 
was  completed  in  the  time  of  Constantine,  "when  it 
was  found  possible  to  dress  the  whole  heathen  mode  of 
life,  without  change,  in  Christian  garments,  and  thereby 
recognize  it  as  Christian."*  So  Tolstoy  joins  the  group 
of  fervent  spirits  who  through  the  ages  have  denounced 
the  donation  of  Constantine. 

Such  is  Tolstoy's  religious  and  moral  system.  One 
is  at  once  led  to  inquire  how  far  his  writings  are  of 
value  as  an  exposition  of  the  real  teaching  of  Jesus,  as 
embodied  in  the  Gospels.  However  unscientific  his 
method  of  study,  his  insight  may  of  course  have  led  him 
to  correct  results.  In  theology,  the  two  great  doctrines 
of  the  Gospels  are  that  of  the  personal  fatherhood  of 
*  My  Religion^  ch.  11, 


242  TOLSTOY 

God,  and  that  of  personal  immortality.  The  second  of 
these  Tolstoy  rejects,  exercising  his  utmost  ingenuity  in 
reading  it  out  of  the  text;  the  first  he  accepts  in  a  nerve- 
less, attenuated  form,  as  the  result  of  the  moral  teach- 
ing of  Jesus  rather  than  the  source  of  it. 

But  with  Tolstoy's  ethical  system  the  case  is  different. 
Though  he  felt  himself  to  be  the  discoverer  and  restorer 
of  the  true  teaching  of  Jesus,  Tolstoy  was  here  treading 
on  ground  often  trodden  by  other  reformers.  His 
teachings  are  similar  in  their  essentials  to  those  of  the 
/^Bohemian  Brethren  in  the  fifteenth  century,  and  of  the 
English  Quakers  in  the  seventeenth,  and,  most  impor- 
tant, to  those  of  the  Dukhobors  and  other  Russian  peas- 
ant sects  in  the  eighteenth  and  nineteenth  centuries. 
We  may  even  say  that  the  wide  acceptance  of  the  doc- 
trine of  non-resistance  in  Russia  during  the  present 
crisis  is  probably  due  less  to  the  influence  of  Tolstoy 
than  to  that  of  less  famous  teachers.  To  such  ideas 
the  Russian  common  folk  lend  a  willing  ear;  and  the 
Russian  common  folk,  one  cannot  too  often  repeat,  were 
a  primary  source  of  inspiration  for  Tolstoy.  Further- 
more, all  of  the  sects  that  have  been  mentioned,  including 
the  Russian,  were  inspired  directly  by  the  Gospels,  the 
precepts  of  which  their  members  endeavored  to  carry 
out  in  their  daily  lives.  And  the  interpretation  was  in 
each  case  just. 

Whether  the  teaching  of  Jesus  was  itself  a  sound  and 
final  system  of  ethics  is  a  different  question.  Let  us 
listen  to  a  modern  biblical  scholar,  whose  estimate  of  the 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      243 

nature  of  Jesus'  teaching,  if  not  of  its  universal  validity, 
is  the  same  as  Tolstoy's: 

Broadly  speaking,  it  may  be  said  that  there  are  two  aspects 
of  ethical  teaching.  The  first  is  that  with  which  in  modern 
times  we  are  so  familiar,  the  teaching  which  says  that  the  first 
thing  a  man  has  to  do  is  to  be  a  good  citizen.  This  is  the 
world-affirming  ethic  which  says  that  this  world  as  we  have  it 
is  God's  world.  That  is  a  perfectly  true  statement:  We 
are  put  here  to  work,  and  if  we  scorn  society,  and  do  not  do 
our  fair  share,  we  are  shirking  the  responsibility  which  has 
been  put  upon  our  shoulders.  Therefore  it  is  our  duty  to  take 
part  in  all  such  things  as  social,  political,  and  national  duties 
(which  may  not  appeal  to  us  very  much  in  themselves),  be- 
cause they  are  the  things  which  we  are  put  here  to  do. 

But  there  is  also  another  kind  of  ethical  teaching — the 
teaching  which  denies  the  world;  which  says  that  these 
social  and  national  claims  are  doubtless  valid,  but  there  is 
something  beyond  them  all,  and  a  man  is  more  than  a  good 
citizen.  There  are  times  when  he  has  the  right  and  the  duty 
not  to  be  hurrying  about,  and  busily  doing  something,  but 
rather  to  go  aside  and  think  about  the  meaning  of  life.  There 
come  times  when  he  will  not  even  be  able  to  do  his  work  in 
the  world  properly,  if  he  do  not  throw  aside  the  world  altogether 
for  a  moment,  and  stand  apart  from  the  hurry  and  toil  of  life 
as  it  is  now,  to  ask  himself  what  he  will  do  in  the  end  thereof. 
This  is  the  world-renouncing  ethic  which  says  that,  although 
many  possessions  and  wide  interests  enable  a  man  not  only  to 
enjoy  life,  but  also  to  do  much  good  to  other  people,  if  he  be 
not  able  at  times  to  throw  off  all  their  claims  he  becomes  the 
slave  of  his  own  surroundings. 

Stated  in  terms  of  modern  life,  it  reminds  us  that  although 


244  TOLSTOY 

it  be  true  that  society,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  is  permanent,  and 
that  the  world  is  not  speedily  coming  to  an  end  by  means  of 
some  dramatic  cataclysm,  it  is  nevertheless  true  that  we 
personally  are  coming  to  an  end,  so  far  as  the  world  or  society 
is  concerned,  within  a  period  which,  after  all,  cannot  be  so 
very  long.  And,  stated  in  the  terms  of  ancient  Jewish  life, 
it  is  this  ethic  which  is  presented  most  vividly  and  most 
strongly  in  just  those  parts  of  the  New  Testament  which 
represent  the  teaching  of  Jesus  when  he  and  his  hearers  were 
looking  at  life  under  the  influence  of  the  eschatological  expec- 
tation. 

The  effect  of  that  expectation  was  to  hide  almost  entirely 
the  more  obvious  duties  of  a  "world-affirming  ethic"  in 
daily  life,  but  in  the  darkness  thus  induced  some  of  the  eternal 
lights  shone  out,  as  the  stars  during  an  eclipse. — [Kirsopp 
Lake,  The  Stewardship  of  Faith  (New  York:  Putnam,  1915) 
pp.  37-40.] 

Jesus,  like  other  Jews  of  his  time,  thought  that  the 
present  state  of  the  world  was  transitory,  soon  to  pass 
away  and  to  give  place  to  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven. 
Hence  his  teaching  gave  no  place  to  state  duties  and 
taught  primarily  preparation  for  a  better  world  to  come; 
it  was  emphatically  world-renouncing.  This  ethic, 
untenable  as  an  all-including  system,  nevertheless  puts 
in  clearer  light  certain  spiritual  values  that  are  apt  to  be 
smothered  by  our  own  complacent  world-ajSfirming 
ethic.  Herein  lies  the  great  value  of  Tolstoy  as  a  moral 
and  social  teacher,  that  he  interprets  the  world-renounc- 
ing ethic  of  Jesus  in  terms  of  modern  life.  His  pe- 
culiarity is  that  he  upholds  so  powerfully  this  ethic  while 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      245 

denying  or  neglecting  the  theological  beliefs  that  lay- 
back  of  it.  With  him  a  pessimistic  emphasis  on  the  ills 
of  the  present  social  world  takes  the  place  of  confidence 
in  a  world  to  come;  yet  his  emphasis  on  inward  spiritual 
blessedness  is  the  same  as  that  of  Jesus. 

That  the  Gospels  were  a  source  of  Tolstoy's  ethical 
system  we  may  admit,  and  that  his  use  of  them  was 
sound  and  logical.  But  whether  they  were  the  only 
source  of  his  system,  or  even  the  real  starting  point  of 
it,  may  be  doubted.  Tolstoy's  developed  system  is  in 
thorough  accord  with  the  temperamental  tendencies 
that  he  had  shown  all  through  his  life.  Its  roots  may 
be  defined  as  individualism,  a  dislike  of  civiKzation  and 
a  Rousseau-like  passion  for  a  return  to  nature,  pessimism, 
asceticism,  and — love. 

The  intense  individualism  of  Tolstoy's  temperament, 
as  shown  both  in  his  life  and  in  his  works  of  fiction, 
has  already  been  amply  emphasized.  Tolstoy  disliked 
public  activity,  resisted  mass  movements,  instinctively 
swam  against  the  stream.  His  philosophy  of  history 
in  War  and  Peace  has  for  its  foundation  the  futility  of 
outward  effort,  while  he  regards  the  perfecting  of  one's 
inward  character  as  the  true  aim  of  man.  So  in  his 
ethical  system  individual  perfection,  in  whatever  that 
may  consist,  is  at  first  all  with  which  he  is  concerned. 
Man  must  shape  his  conduct  by  the  inward  light  that 
is  given  him  and  let  the  results  take  care  of  themselves. 
Church  and  state,  Tolstoy  sees,  will  be  destroyed  by  the 


246  TOLSTOY 

adoption  of  his  teaching,  but  in  church  and  state  he  is 
not  interested.  It  is  only  later  that,  in  What  Shall  We 
Do  Then?,  he  formulates  the  new  order  of  society  to 
which  his  system  will  lead. 

Formerly  Tolstoy  had  preferred  barbarism  to  civiliza- 
tion (as  in  The  Cossacks),  or  had  glorified  the  Ufe  of 
toiling  field  laborers  in  opposition  to  that  of  luxurious 
aristocrats  (as  in  Anna  Karenin),  because  civilized  lux- 
ury enfeebles  man  and  makes  difficult  his  struggle  with 
nature.*  His  position  was  that  of  Rousseau:  it  is  too 
late  to  destroy  civilization;  we  must  try  to  mitigate  its 
ills  while  preserving  its  finer  sides.  Rousseau,  and 
Tolstoy  following  him,  had  weighed  the  bad  sides  of 
modern  culture  against  its  benefits,  and  had  deplored  its 
rise.  Rousseau  had  seen  the  inconsistency  between 
patriotism  and  the  Christianity  of  the  Gospels:  one 
cannot  be  a  good  Christian  and  a  good  soldier.  But  so 
convinced  was  he  of  the  necessity  for  state  organization 
that  he  banished  Christianity  from  his  ideal  community 
and  replaced  it  by  a  sort  of  official  deism,  with  reverence 
for  the  laws  as  a  cardinal  doctrine.  With  this  state 
religion  individual  Christianity  must  make  its  peace  as 
best  it  may.  Now,  after  his  rehgious  conversion,  Tolstoy 
sees  the  same  dilemma,  and  forthwith  sacrifices  the 
state,  since  it  is  necessarily  inconsistent  with  Christianity; 
patriotism,  which  leads  to  violence  and  war,  becomes  a 
cardinal  sin.  Now  he  sees  the  chief  evil  of  civihzation 
in  the  fact  that  it  forces  a  man  to  exploit  the  labor 
*  Behrs:  Reminiscences,  ch.  6. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      247 

of  his  fellow  men,  since  without  such  exploitation  riches 
and  idle  ease  are  impossible. 

Of  his  own  despair  and  pessimism  Tolstoy  tells  us 
eloquently  in  his  Confession;  we  may  judge  of  it  in- 
directly by  his  long  devotion  to  Schopenhauer.  Yet 
Tolstoy's  pessimism  was  after  all  superficial;  it  was  a 
deepening  of  Rousseau's  dislike  for  modern  society,  com- 
bined with  personal  discouragement  at  his  own  failure 
to  solve  the  riddle  of  existence.  But  in  his  view  of 
human  nature  Tolstoy  was  never  a  thorough  pessimist; 
he  never  lost  faith  in  the  optimism  of  his  earlier  master 
Rousseau.  Pessimism  is  a  belief  that  the  non-existence 
of  the  universe  would  be  preferable  to  its  existence. 
Such  a  belief  steals  into  our  minds  as  we  read  the  novels 
of  Hardy  or  the  tales  of  Guy  de  Maupassant.  The 
offence  lies  not  in  the  portrayal  of  sin  and  shame,  but 
in  the  denial  of  any  possibility  of  improvement  or  in  the 
negation  of  all  standards  of  right  and  wrong.  Tolstoy's 
joy  in  the  beauty  of  the  world,  his  delight  in  physical 
strength  and  vigor,  and  his  confidence  in  the  possibility 
of  moral  progress,  exclude  any  such  tone  from  his  novels 
previous  to  his  religious  conversion.  War  and  Peace 
and  Anna  Karenin  are  books  wherein  "all  noble  lords  and 
ladies"  "shall  find  many  joyous  and  pleasant  histories 
and  noble  and  renowned  acts  of  humanity,  gentleness, 
and  chivalry.  For  herein  may  be  seen  noble  chivalry, 
courtesy,  humanity,  friendliness,  hardiness,  love,  friend- 
ship, cowardice,  murder,  hate,  virtue,  sin.  Do  after 
the  good,  and  leave  the  evil,  and  it  shall  bring  you  to 


248  TOLSTOY 

good  fame  and  renommee."*  And,  unlike  Malory, 
Tolstoy  is  so  convincing  in  his  picture  of  this  checker- 
board world  that  "all  noble  lords  and  ladies"  find  them- 
selves constrained  "to  give  faith  and  behef  that  all  is 
true  that  is  contained  herein."  The  vital  force  that 
saved  Tolstoy  from  suicide  kept  his  picture  of  the  world 
from  becoming  black  and  despairing. 

In  the  artistic  work  that  followed  Tolstoy's  religious 
conversion  there  is,  as  we  shall  see,  a  decided  change  of 
tone.  The  author's  altered  point  of  view  shows  in  his 
darker  picture  of  the  world  as  at  present  organized, 
which  indeed  would  better  perish  and  pass  away.  When 
pessimism  has  lost  its  hold  on  his  philosophy  it  becomes 
more  prominent  in  his  fiction.  From  The  Death  of  Ivan 
Ilyichy  The  Power  of  Darkness,  The  Kreutzer  Sonata,  and 
Resurrection  the  former  instinctive  joy  of  life  has  van- 
ished, while  the  new  gospel  of  love  and  hope  is  expressed 
only  in  a  pale,  ineffectual  fashion.  The  artist  and  the 
preacher  in  Tolstoy  never  worked  in  perfect  harmony. 

The  ascetic  element  in  Tolstoy's  thought  may  be 
detected  even  in  his  earliest  novels.  Though  Tolstoy 
instinctively  admires  beauty  and  strength,  when  he 
begins  to  reason  on  conduct  he  preaches  self-sacrifice, 
self-abnegation,  self-limitation;  each  of  his  heroes, 
Olenin,  Pierre  Bezukhov,  Levin,  struggles  upward  by 
a  process  that  contains  distinct  ascetic  elements,  though 
it  may  also  contain  elements  of  a  quite  different  sort. 
Now,  in  his  Harmony  of  the  Gospels,  when  he  proclaims 
*  Caxton's  preface  to  Malory's  Morte  Darthur. 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  HEIIGlOtJS  SYSTEM     m 

that  all  property  is  a  hindrance  to  the  moral  life,  and 
bids  men  be  beggars  and  vagrants,  he  expresses  the 
ascetic  ideal  with  perfect  distinctness: 

Jesus  Christ  nowhere  bids  us  give  to  the  poor  in  order 
that  the  poor  may  be  well  fed  and  content;  he  says  that 
one  should  give  all  to  the  poor  in  order  that  he  himself  may 
be  happy.  ...  He  bids  us  give  up  property  only  in  order 
that  it  may  not  be  an  obstacle  to  life;  and  afterwards,  when 
a  man  gives  up  his  property,  he  teaches  that  a  man's 
happiness  consists  in  pitying  and  loving  men. — [Harmony, 
ch.  6.] 

Denial  of  the  personal  life,  of  the  animal  life  of  the 
body,  is  at  the  foundation  of  Tolstoy's  religious  system. 
The  distinction  that  he  makes  between  the  monk  and 
the  pious  mendicant  is  only  one  of  external  form;  the 
monk  and  the  mendicant  follow  the  same  aim,  the 
salvation  of  their  own  souls,  and  by  essentially  the  same 
means.  In  a  letter  to  his  wife  (1898)  he  quotes 
with  enthusiasm  the  following  passage  from  a  book 
that  he  has  been  reading:  "Luxury  and  effeminacy 
hinder  the  soul  from  understanding  itself.  In  the 
same  way  asceticism,  the  torturing  of  one's  body, 
also  hinders.  In  both  cases  man  thinks  of  the  body. 
But  one  must  forget  it."*  Yet  it  is  so  obvious  that 
sincere  forgetfulness  of  the  body  is  itself  a  form  of 
asceticism. 

Tolstoy  himself  always  stoutly  denied  that  his  teaching 
*  Letters  to  Wife,  p.  559. 


250  TOLSTOY 

was  ascetic.    The  following  passage,  written  in  1882,  is 
characteristic: 

Some  men,  seeing  in  the  teaching  of  Christ  a  teaching 
about  the  salvation  of  the  soul  for  the  sake  of  a  crudely  con- 
ceived eternal  life,  have  withdrawn  from  the  world,  taking 
pains  only  about  what  they  should  do  for  themselves,  how 
they  should  perfect  themselves  in  solitude — which  would  be 
ridiculous  were  it  not  pitiable.  And  terrible  efforts  have  been 
wasted  by  these  men — and  there  have  been  many  of  them — on 
what  is  impossible  and  stupid,  on  doing  good  for  oneself  in 
solitude,  away  from  men.  ...  I  love  these  people,  but  with 
all  the  strength  of  my  soul  I  hate  their  teaching.  .  .  .  Truth 
is  only  in  that  teaching  which  points  out  an  activity,  a  life, 
which  satisfies  the  needs  of  the  soul,  and  which  is  at  the  same 
time  a  constant  activity  for  the  good  of  others. — [Letter  to 
N,  N,:  On  Non-Resistance  to  Evil  by  Evil] 

All  this  means  that  the  ascetic  element  in  his  teaching, 
which  in  time  will  become  more  prominent,  is  as  yet 
overshadowed  by  his  ideal  of  service,  of  universal  love. 

If  asceticism  be  related  to  the  reflective,  intellectual 
side  of  Tolstoy,  his  ideal  of  love  springs  from  the  warm, 
emotional  element  in  his  personality.  From  his  childhood 
Tolstoy  was  a  man  of  passionate  nature,  constant  in  his 
affection  for  his  brothers  and  kinsfolk,  and  later  on  he 
was  equally  constant  in  his  devotion  to  his  wife  and 
children.  He  was  a  steadfast  friend  to  a  few  chosen 
persons  both  in  his  own  circle  and  among  the  common 
people,  though  his  decided  opinions,  and  his  pugnacious, 
uncompromising  support  of  them,  prevented  him  from 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM      251 

having  many  intellectual  intimates.  His  aristocratic 
prejudices  also  hindered  him  from  extending  his  personal 
ties.  Now,  under  the  influence  of  the  Gospels,  his  whole 
nature  softened,  and  from  being  a  haughty  noble  he 
became  an  open-hearted  lover  of  all  humanity,  ready 
to  receive  each  and  every  visitor  and  converse  with  him 
on  questions  of  the  soul.  His  kind  heart  led  him  to  assist 
any  peasant  in  misery,  whether  by  personal  toil  or  by 
gifts  of  the  money  that  he  despised.  Logic  would  have 
made  him  see  that  if  property,  and  money  in  particular, 
is  a  sin,  then  to  force  goods  on  others  leads  them  into 
sin;  his  emotions  restrained  him  from  that  logical  conse- 
quence. His  family  affection  made  him  erect  the  same 
ideal  for  other  men;  later  his  asceticism  will  force  him 
to  tear  down  his  own  edifice. 

In  My  Religion  (1884)  Tolstoy  makes  most  prominent 
the  negative  side  of  his  teaching,  the  fiYe  prohibitions. 
But  in  his  Preface  to  Bondarev's  Worhy  *'0n  Labor  for 
One's  Daily  Breads'*  written  in  the  same  year,  he  points 
out  that  "all  Christ's  positive  teaching  of  truth  is  ex- 
pressed in  one  phrase,  *Love  God  and  thy  neighbor  as 
thyself!'"  The  five  prohibitions  are  merely  sign- 
posts erected  to  show  man  where  he  is  likely  to  stray 
from  the  true  path.  And  in  his  work  On  Life  (1887)  he 
lays  all  emphasis  on  lovCy  which  springs  from  the  re- 
nunciation of  the  animal  personality: 

Not  in  consequence  of  love  for  father,  for  son,  for  wife, 
for  friends,  for  good  and  dear  people,  as  is  ordinarily  thought. 


552  TOLSTOY 

do  men  renounce  their  personality,  but  only  in  consequence 
of  a  consciousness  of  the  vanity  of  the  existence  of  the  per- 
sonality, of  a  consciousness  of  the  impossibility  of  its  good; 
and  therefore  in  consequence  of  renunciation  of  the  life  of 
personality  man  recognizes  true  love  and  can  truly  love  father, 
son,  wife,  children,  and  friends. 

Love  is  the  preference  of  other  creatures  to  himself — ^to  his 
animal  personality.   .    .    . 

This  condition  is  a  condition  of  good  will  towards  all  men, 
which  is  present  in  children,  but  which  in  a  grown  man  arises 
only  on  the  renunciation  of  the  good  of  personality  and  in- 
creases only  in  proportion  to  that  renunciation. — [On  Life, 
ch.  24.] 

True  love  is  life  itself  .—[Ch.  25.] 

They  say:  *' Disease,  old  age,  senility,  a  decline  into  childish- 
ness are  an  annihilation  of  the  consciousness  and  life  of  man.'* 
For  what  manner  of  Tnan?  I  imagine  to  myself,  according  to 
the  tradition,  John  the  Evangelist,  who  declined  from  old 
age  into  childishness.  He,  according  to  the  tradition,  said 
only:  "Brothers,  love  one  another!"  The  hundred-year-old 
man,  barely  able  to  move,  with  watering  eyes,  mumbles  only 
these  same  monotonous  three  words,  *'Love  one  another!"  In 
such  a  man  the  animal  existence  barely  glimmers — it  has  been 
all  consumed  by  a  new  relation  to  the  world,  by  a  new  living 
creature,  which  no  longer  finds  a  place  in  the  existence  of  the 
carnal  man. — [Ch.  30.] 

In  conclusion,  it  may  be  worth  while  to  indicate  very 
briefly  the  formal  characteristics  of  Tolstoy's  ethical 
system.  Ethical  theories  may  be  divided  into  two 
types,  jural  and  teleological :  theories  of  the  first  sort 
regard  conduct  as  obedience  to  a  set  of  rules  laid  down 


THE  CRISIS;    THE  RELIGIOUS  SYSTEM     253 

by  some  authority;  those  of  the  second  sort  regard 
conduct  as  directed  to  a  certain  end,  and  inquire  .what 
end  is  the  most  appropriate.  The  hedonists  find  that 
this  end  is  pleasure,  whether  of  the  individual  or  of 
humanity  as  a  whole,  while  the  eudsemonists  find  it  in 
the  complete,  harmonious  development  of  all  human 
powers  and  capacities.  Such  development  may  produce 
pleasure,  but  pleasure  is  not  the  aim  of  the  development. 
On  the  other  hand,  some  at  least  of  the  hedonists  would 
maintain  that  pleasure  demands  as  its  tool  (though 
not  as  an  end  in  itself)  the  harmonious  development 
that  the  eudsemonists  regard  as  an  end  in  itself.  Thus 
the  two  types  of  teleological  theory  in  their  best  forms 
meet  on  a  common  ground. 

Tolstoy's  ethics  are  of  the  jural  type.  Like  Kant,  he 
regards  conduct  as  obedience  to  an  ideal  of  duty,  an 
inborn  moral  sense,  a  categorical  imperative  imprinted 
on  the  soul  of  each  individual  man.  This  is  the  char- 
acteristic Puritan  point  of  view,  though  the  Puritan 
may  regard  conduct  as  laid  down  by  an  external  deity 
rather  than  by  man's  inborn  moral  sense.  Tolstoy  gives 
the  name  reason  to  the  source  of  moral  conduct,  and  he 
may  rightly  be  regarded,  like  Kant,  as  a  rationalist. 

Every  jural  system  of  ethics  may,  however,  be  re- 
garded from  a  teleological  side.  The  Jews  presumably 
had  a  distinct  idea  of  the  purposes  of  the  Lord  in  or- 
daining the  decalogue.  Here  Tolstoy  must  be  regarded, 
ridiculous  as  the  term  seems  at  first  sight,  as  a  hedonist; 
he  has  absolutely  no  points  of  contact  with  the  character- 


254  TOLSTOY 

istic  Greek  eudsemonism  of  Plato  and  Aristotle,  with 
its  ideal  of  the  harmonious  development  of  the  human 
faculties.  For  asceticism  is  after  all  only  a  distorted 
and  perverted  type  of  hedonism,  its  aim  being  to  gain 
pleasure  in  the  next  life,  as  with  monks,  or  to  ward  off 
misery  in  this  life,  as  with  Schopenhauer  and  Tolstoy. 
And  Tolstoy's  theory  of  universal  love  and  self-sacrificing 
service  has  as  its  aim  the  greater  happiness  of  the  mass 
of  humanity;  that  is,  it  is  a  utilitarian  hedonism.  Each 
of  these  doctrines  neglects  the  harmonious  development 
of  personality  that  was  the  aim  of  Greek  eudsemonism 
and  the  method  of  the  best  Greek  hedonism.  As  an 
ethical  thinker  no  man  was  ever  more  un-Greek  than 
Tolstoy. 

Tolstoy  has  a  further  point  of  contact  with  Kant  in  his 
insistence  on  the  universality  of  any  principle  of  human 
conduct.  He  will  have  no  division  of  humanity  into 
monks  and  laymen  such  as  came  to  pass  both  in  Chris- 
tianity and  Buddhism,  where  an  ideal  system  of  conduct 
was  admitted  to  be  beyond  the  reach  of  the  mass  of 
humanity.  His  ideal,  he  insists,  may  be  attained  by 
every  man. 

But  this  formal  classification  of  Tolstoy's  system  does 
it  no  justice.  Tolstoy  is  primarily  a  preacher,  a  religious 
leader,  not  a  philosopher.  His  great  service,  one  should 
repeat  again  and  again,  is  not  the  formulation  of  any 
consistent  and  vahd  system  of  ethics,  but  the  powerful 
application  to  modern  conditions  of  the  world-renounc- 
ing ethics  of  Jesus. 


CHAPTER  VIII 


life:  1878-1910 


OR  five  years  (1878-83)  Tolstoy  was  wholly 
absorbed  in  meditation  and  writing  on  re- 
ligious topics.  He  seemed  to  have  abandoned 
forever  his  work  as  a  novelist.  Earnest 
and  sincere,  he  felt  the  incongruity  of  his  own  life 
with  the  ideas  and  the  ideals  which  he  had  formed 
and  which  he  was  now  working  out  into  a  system. 
The  new  faith  did  not  bring  with  it  an  entire  change 
in  his  life,  for  the  habits  of  fifty  years  were  not  to 
be  laid  aside  suddenly  like  a  garment.  Its  first  effect 
was  to  bring  on  fits  of  depression  and  irritability. 
His  son  Ilya  tells  of  the  altered  atmosphere  in  the 
family: 


As  a  boy  of  twelve  [1878],  I  felt  that  my  father  was  getting 
more  and  more  estranged  from  us,  and  that  our  interests  were 
not  merely  indifferent  to  him,  but  actually  alien  and  repulsive. 
He  got  gloomy  and  irritable,  often  quarreled  with  my  mother 
about  trifles,  and  from  our  former  jovial  and  high-spirited  ring- 
leader and  companion  was  transformed  before  our  eyes  into 
a  stern  and  censorious  propagandist.  His  harsh  denunciations 
of  the  aimless  life  of  gentlefolk,  of  their  gluttony,  their  in- 

255 


Q56  TOLSTOY 

dolence,  and  spoliation  of  the  industrious  working-classes,  grew 
more  and  more  frequent.  .  .  . 

When  I  recall  this  period,  I  am  filled  with  horror  at  the 
thought  of  what  he  must  have  been  suffering  mentally.  When 
he  utterly  repudiated  everything  he  had  delighted  in  before, 
repudiated  that  patriarchal  order  of  country-house  life  which 
he  had  lately  described  in  his  novels  with  such  affection  and 
which  he  had  built  up  for  himself,  repudiated  all  his  former 
interests,  from  war  down  to  literary  fame,  family  life  and 
religion — ^how  terribly  his  solitude  must  have  weighed  upon 
him!  All  the  more  terribly  because  it  was  the  solitude  of  a 
man  in  the  midst  of  a  crowd  of  people  with  whom  he  had 
nothing  in  common. — [Reminiscences,  pp.  261,  266.] 

His  cousin  the  Countess  Alexandra  Tolstoy  tells  how 
he  poured  forth  upon  her,  when  she  met  him  in  Moscow 
in  1882,  his  derisive  mockery  of  the  church  beliefs  to 
which  she  was  devoted: 

"I  have  no  reply  to  make  to  you,"  I  answered,  "and  will 
say  only  that,  while  you  were  speaking,  I  saw  you  contending 
with  someone  who  is  now  standing  behind  your  chair." 

He  turned  about  quickly.  "Who  is  that.^"  he  almost 
shouted. 

"Lucifer  in  person,  the  incarnation  of  pride,"  I  answered. 

He  jumped  from  his  seat,  overwhelmed  by  this  phrase; 
then  he  tried  to  calm  himself  and  immediately  added: 

"Certainly  I  am  proud  to  have  been  the  first  who  has  at 
last  laid  his  hand  upon  the  truth. "... 

Li  the  evening  I  went  to  call  on  them  and  found  the  so 
recently  infuriated  Leo  a  meek  lamb.  Beside  the  numerous 
family,   outsiders   were   present,   and   the   conversation   was 


LIFE:    1878-1910  257 

general;  but  Leo  guided  it  with  evident  care  that  nothing 
unpleasant  should  touch  me;  he  gazed  at  me  with  gentle 
eyes,  as  if  asking  forgiveness,  and  the  whole  evening  paid 
attention  to  me  with  that  enchanting  kindness  which  is  a 
distinctive  trait  of  his  beautiful  nature. — [Reminiscences,  in 
Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  pp.  29,  30.] 

An  early  result  of  Tolstoy's  new  faith  was  a  letter  to 
the  young  tsar  Alexander  III,  begging  him  to  give  the 
world  an  example  of  Christian  forgiveness  by  pardoning 
the  assassins  of  his  father.  On  March  13,  1881,  Alex- 
ander II  had  been  murdered  on  the  streets  of  St.  Peters- 
burg by  a  group  of  revolutionists  who  desired  the  trans- 
formation of  Russia  into  a  democratic  state,  organized  on 
socialistic  principles.  Tolstoy's  letter,  full  of  eloquence, 
animated  at  once  by  a  scorn  of  revolutionary  violence 
and  by  the  loyalty  to  the  tsar  that  ran  in  Tolstoy's 
blood,  reminds  the  new  ruler  that  both  severe  repression 
and  liberal  concessions  have  failed  to  restore  peace  to 
Russia,  and  urges  him  now  to  adopt  the  one  true  path, 
that  shown  on  men  by  Christ  himself.  The  letter 
reached  the  tsar,  but  failed  of  its  purpose. 

On  October  10,  1883,  Tolstoy  made  one  modest  step 
towards  the  realization  of  his  teaching  by  refusing,  on 
the  ground  of  religious  convictions,  to  serve  on  a  jury, 
and  paying  the  fine  imposed  on  him. 

Property  was  the  great  stumbling-block  when  Tolstoy 
tried  to  apply  his  convictions  to  life.  The  recognition 
of  private  property  as  a  sin  and  form  of  violence  is 
fundamental  in  his  religious  system;    it  had  probably 


258  TOLSTOY 

been  maturing  in  his  mind  long  before  his  conversion. 
In  1861,  as  has  been  said,  Tolstoy  had  met  Proudhon  in 
Brussels,  and  had  presumably  been  impressed  by  his 
maxim:  "La  propriete — c'est  le  vol."  In  1865  he 
made  in  his  diary  the  following  startling  entry,  which 
might  have  been  written  by  one  of  the  Russian  Social 
Revolutionists; 

The  problem  of  Russia  in  universal  history  consists  in 
bringing  into  the  world  the  idea  of  the  communal  organization 
of  land  property. 

**La  propriete — c'est  le  vol"  [property  is  theft]  will  re- 
main truer  than  the  truth  of  the  English  constitution  so 
long  as  the  human  race  shall  exist.  This  is  an  absolute  truth, 
but  there  are  also  relative  truths  flowing  from  it — applica- 
tions. The  first  of  these  relative  truths  is  the  Russian  people's 
view  of  property.  The  Russian  people  denies  property  of  the 
most  stable  sort,  that  which  is  the  most  independent  of  toil, 
the  property  which  more  than  any  other  cramps  the  right 
of  other  people  to  acquire  property — ^namely,  property  in 
land.  This  is  not  a  dream;  it  is  a  fact,  expressed  in  the  com- 
munes of  the  peasants  and  the  communes  of  the  Cossacks. 
This  truth  is  understood  alike  by  the  learned  Russian  and 
by  the  peasant,  who  says:  "Let  them  enroll  us  as  Cossacks 
and  the  land  will  be  free."  This  idea  has  a  future.  The  Rus- 
sian revolution  can  be  founded  only  on  this.  The  revolution 
will  not  be  against  the  tsar  and  the  despotism,  but  against  land 
property.  It  will  say:  "Take  from  me,  take  and  strip  from 
man  all  that  you  wish,  but  leave  us  the  land  in  its  entirety." 
The  autocracy  does  not  hinder  but  aids  that  order  of  things. 

All  this  I  saw  in  a  dream  on  August  25.     [Biryuk6v:  II,  69.] 


LIFE:    1878-1910  259 

This  passage  is  another  illustration  of  the  fact  that 
Tolstoy's  new  faith  merely  gave  new  emphasis  and  a 
new  logical  foundation  to  ideas  that  were  already  latent 
in  his  mind.  It  is  of  interest  in  connection  with  the 
present  revolution  in  Russia,  which  is  striving  to  deal 
with  the  question  of  property  in  land. 

After  his  conversion  Tolstoy  was  confronted  with  a 
dilemma.  He  could  not  live  in  luxury  and  be  true  to  his 
principles;  neither  could  he  force  his  wife  and  children 
to  abandon  their  accustomed  way  of  life.  The  consistent 
solution  would  have  been  to  abandon  wife  and  children 
and  go  forth  from  home  as  a  religious  beggar,  like  so 
many  thousands  before  him.  For  this  choice  Tolstoy 
frankly  admitted  that  he  had  not  the  courage.  Family 
life  had  saved  him  from  dissoluteness  and  had  long  kept 
him  from  despair.  His  love  of  it,  almost  worship  of  it, 
persisted  long  after  the  formation  of  a  religious  ideal 
which,  as  he  himself  finally  perceived,  was  fundamentally 
inconsistent  with  it.    In  May,  1881,  he  noted  in  his  diary : 

The  family  is  flesh.  To  abandon  one's  family  is  the  second 
temptation — to  kill  oneself.  The  family  is  one  body.  But  do 
not  yield  to  the  third  temptation:  serve  not  the  family,  but 
God  alone.  This  is  an  indication  of  the  place  on  the  economic 
ladder  that  man  should  occupy.  It  is  flesh;  as  for  a  weak 
stomach  light  food  is  necessary,  so  for  a  pampered  family 
more  is  needed  than  for  one  wonted  to  privations. — [Biryukov: 
n,  381.1 

The  change  was  gradual.  In  1881  a  letter  to  his 
wife  shows  him  much  interested  in  an  edition  of  his 


260  TOLSTOY 

works  and  very  much  alive  to  financial  considerations.* 
In  the  next  year  a  letter  from  the  province  of  Samara 
shows  him  occupied  with  the  practical  success  of  his 
estate  there. f  ,  Later  on  he  simply  neglected  his  prop- 
erty, trying  to  treat  it  as  if  it  did  not  exist.  A  letter  to 
his  wife  on  November  5,  1884,  shows  him  thoroughly 
dissatisfied  with  this  course  and  resolved  on  a  com- 
promise: 

I  have  been  thinking  much  and  well  about  the  fact  that 
while  we  live  and  as  we  live  I  must  conduct  the  estate  myself. 
Begin  at  Ydsnaya.  I  have  a  plan  how  to  conduct  it  in  ac- 
cord with  my  convictions.  Perhaps  this  is  hard,  but  I  must 
do  it.  My  general  reasoning  is  as  follows:  to  say  nothing  of 
the  fact  that  if  we  take  advantage  of  the  conduct  of  business 
on  principles  (false)  of  private  property,  then  we  must,  never- 
theless, conduct  it  in  the  best  fashion  in  the  sense  of  justice, 
harmlessness,  and,  if  possible,  of  kindness.  To  say  nothing 
of  this,  it  has  become  clear  to  me^  that  if  what  I  regard  as 
truth  and  the  law  of  men  is  really  to  become  that  law  in  life, 
then  this  will  occur  only  if  we,  rich  oppressors,  shall  volun- 
tarily renounce  riches  and  oppression;  and  this  will  occur  not 
suddenly,  but  by  a  slow  process,  which  will  lead  to  it.  This 
process  can  occur  only  when  we  ourselves  shall  direct  our 
own  affairs,  and,  above  all,  enter  into  relations  with  the 
common  people  who  work  for  us.  I  wish  to  try  to  do  so.  I 
wish  to  try  with  complete  freedom,  without  violence,  and  in 
accordance  with  goodness,  to  conduct  this  business  at  Ydsnaya 
myself.  I  tliink  that  there  will  be  no  great  mistake  or  loss, 
perhaps  none  at  all.  And  maybe  it  will  be  a  good  deed.  I 
*  Letters  to  Wife,  p.  127.  f  Ibid.,  p.  136. 


LIFE:    1878-1910  261 

should  like  at  a  favorable  moment,  when  you  are  listening,  to 
tell  you  about  it,  but  to  describe  it  is  hard.  I  think  of  beginning 
right  off.  To  take  over  the  whole  thing  from  Mitrofan  and 
arrange  it,  and  during  the  winter  to  make  occasional  trips, 
and  beginning  with  spring  to  occupy  myself  with  it  constantly. 
Perhaps  here,  unconsciously,  I  am  bribed  by  a  desire  to  be 
more  frequently  in  the  country,  but  I  feel  that  my  life  has  been 
ill  ordered  by  this  turning  aside,  this  ignoring  of  work  which 
was  being  done,  and  done  for  me,  and  which  was  absolutely 
contrary  to  my  convictions.  In  this  ignoring  there  was  also 
the  element  that  I,  denying  property  on  principle,  in  the  sight 
of  men,  from  Jausse  horde  did  not  wish  to  occupy  myself  with 
property,  in  order  that  I  might  not  be  reproached  with  in- 
consistency. Now  it  seems  to  me  that  I  have  outgrown  this. 
I  know  by  my  conscience  just  how  consistent  I  am.  But,  my 
darling,  please  bear  in  mind  that  this  matter  is  one  that 
touches  me  very  nearly,  and  do  not  oppose  me  heedlessly 
and  hastily  and  do  not  disturb  my  frame  of  mind.  I  am  sure 
that  no  harm  will  come  of  this  and  perhaps  something  good 
and  important  will  result. — [Letters  to  Wife,  pp.  223,  224.] 

And  in  this  same  letter  Tolstoy  asks  his  wife  to  advertise 
the  sale  of  some  horses. 

Apparently  nothing  came  of  this  plan  for  Christian 
farming,  and  Tolstoy  lapsed  into  his  previous  indiffer- 
ence. His  wife  was  at  one  time  ready  to  appeal  to  the 
authorities  to  have  his  property  put  under  guardianship, 
in  order  to  preserve  it  for  the  children,  when  he  wished 
to  distribute  it  to  outsiders.*  In  1891  the  vexed 
question  was  settled  by  Tolstoy's  dividing  his  estates 
*  Behrs:  Reminiscences,  ch.  6, 


2G2  TOLSTOY 

among  his  wife  and  his  children,  his  wife  retaining  the 
copyright  in  his  earher  works.  The  works  written  after 
Anna  Karenin  became  the  property  of  every  man.  This 
was  against  the  protest  of  the  Countess  Tolstoy,  who 
had  a  real  grievance  in  the  case  of  The  Death  of  Ivan 
Ilyichy  which  her  husband  had  given  her  as  a  name-day 
present,  to  be  included  in  a  new  edition  of  his  works.* 
After  1891  Tolstoy  lived  as  a  guest  in  houses  belonging  to 
others,  f 

Tolstoy  burned  with  eagerness  to  communicate  to  his 
wife  something  of  his  own  new  faith.  In  May,  1892,  he 
wrote  to  his  disciple  Feinermann : 

I  am  terribly  eager  to  give  her  at  least  a  part  of  the  re- 
ligious consciousness  that  I  possess  (though  feebly,  still  to  a 
degree  that  gives  me  the  possibility  of  sometimes  rising  above 
the  griefs  of  life),  because  I  know  that  only  this,  this  con- 
sciousness of  God  and  of  one's  own  sonship  to  him,  gives  life; 
and  I  hope  that  it  will  be  imparted  to  her — of  course,  not 
from  me,  but  from  God.  Although  this  consciousness  is  im- 
parted to  women  with  great  difficulty. — [Letters,  collected  by 
Sergeyenko  (Moscow,  1910) :  I,  214,  215.1 

His  wife  looked  up  to  him  with  all  her  old  devotion,  and 
regarded  him  as  a  man  in  advance  of  his  age.  Yet 
devotion  to  her  children  kept  her  at  her  post.  She 
told  her  brother  with  tears  in  her  eyes; 

It  is  hard  for  me  now;  I  have  to  do  everything  alone,  while 
formerly  I  was  only  a  helper.    The  property  and  the  education 
*  letters  to  Wife,  pp.  354-57.  f  Maude:  II,  426,  427,  513. 


LIFE:     1878-1910  263 

of  the  children  are  entirely  in  my  hands.  They  blame  me  be- 
cause I  do  this  and  do  not  go  begging  alms!  Would  I  not  go 
forth  with  him  if  I  did  not  have  little  children!  But  he  has 
forgotten  all  for  his  teaching!* 

This  difference  in  ideals  macje  constant  friction  and 
^discord  between  the  Count  and  the  Countess,  which 
alternated  with  bursts  of  passionate  affection.  Tolstoy, 
feeling  that  his  new  teaching  had  brought  strife  into 
his  life  rather  than  peace,  pathetically  told  Feinermann 
that  love  of  those  distant  from  us  is  a  sin  that  hampers 
our  love  of  those  near  at  hand.f  Yet  at  the  bottom  of 
his  heart  his  love  of  his  wife  survived  with  all  its  youthful 
fervor.  In  May,  1897,  he  wrote  to  her  in  Moscow, 
whither  she  had  returned  after  a  two  days'  visit  to 
Yasnaya  Polyana: 

What  sort  of  a  trip  did  you  have,  and  how  are  you  now,  my 
dear.'^  By  your  coming  you  left  such  a  strong,  cheerful,  good 
impression,  even  too  good  a  one  for  me,  because  1  feel  the  lack 
of  you  the  more  strongly.  My  awakening  and  your  appearance 
[in  the  early  morning  of  a  marvelous  May  day]  is  one  of  the 
strongest  joyful  impressions  that  I  have  ever  experienced, 
and  that  at  the  age  of  sixty-nine,  from  a  woman  of  Miy- 
ihree.~[Letters  to  Wife,  p.  523.] 

Once  at  least  before  his  last  journey  Tolstoy  resolved 
to  make  the  supreme  renunciation  and  to  go  forth  into 
the  world  alone.    Less  than  two  months  after  the  out- 

*  Behrs:  Reminiscences,  ch.  6. 

t  Teneromo:    Living  Words  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy,  pp.  1,  2. 


264  TOLSTOY 

burst  of  affection  that  has  just  been  quoted  he  wrote  to 
his  wife  the  following  letter: 

Dear  Sonya,  I  have  long  been  tortured  by  the  inconsist- 
ency of  my  life  with  my  beliefs.  To  force  you  to  change  your 
life,  your  habits,  to  which  I  myself  have  trained  you,  I  have 
been  unable;  to  leave  you  I  have  hitherto  also  been  unable, 
thinking  that  I  should  deprive  the  children,  while  they  were 
still  small,  of  even  that  little  influence  which  I  might  have 
on  them,  and  that  I  should  grieve  you;  but  to  continue  to  live 
as  I  have  lived  for  these  sixteen  years,  now  quarreling  with 
you  and  irritating  you,  now  myself  submitting  to  the  tempta- 
tions to  wliich  I  am  accustomed  and  by  which  I  am  sur- 
rounded, I  am  also  no  longer  able,  and  I  have  decided  to 
do  now  what  I  wished  to  do  long  ago,  to  leave:  in  the  first 
place,  with  my  continually  advancing  years,  this  life  becomes 
harder  and  harder  for  me,  and  I  more  and  more  long  for  soli- 
tude— and  in  the  second  place,  because  the  children  have  grown 
up,  my  influence  is  no  longer  needed  in  the  house,  and  you  all 
have  more  living  interests,  which  will  make  my  absence  Uttle 
noticed  by  you. 

The  principal  thing  is  that  as  the  Hindus  at  the  age  of 
sixty  retreat  into  the  forest,  as  every  old,  religious  man  wishes 
to  consecrate  the  last  years  of  his  life  to  God,  and  not  to 
jokes,  puns,  gossip,  and  tennis,  so  I,  entering  on  my  seventieth 
year,  with  all  the  strength  of  my  soul  long  for  that  calm  and 
solitude,  and  if  not  perfect  agreement,  at  least  not  clamorous 
disagreement  between  my  life  and  my  beliefs,  my  conscience. 

If  I  should  do  this  openly,  there  would  be  requests,  re- 
provals,  quarrels,  complaints,  and  I  should  remain,  perhaps, 
and  should  not  carry  out  my  decision — and  it  should  be  carried 
put.    And  therefore  please  pardon  me  if  my  act  pains  you,  and 


LIFE:    1878-1910  ^65 

in  your  soul,  above  all,  Sonya,  let  me  go  with  good  will  and 
do  not  seek  me,  and  do  not  complain  of  me,  do  not  condemn 
me. 

That  I  have  left  you  does  not  prove  that  I  have  been  dis- 
contented with  you.  I  know  that  you  could  not,  literally 
could  not  and  cannot  see  and  feel  as  I  do,  and  therefore  could 
not  and  cannot  change  your  life  and  make  sacrifices  for  the 
sake  of  a  truth  that  you  do  not  recognize.  And  therefore  I 
do  not  condemn  you;  but,  on  the  contrary,  I  remember  with 
love  and  gratitude  the  long  thirty-five  years  of  our  life,  es- 
pecially the  first  half  of  that  time,  when  you,  with  the  motherly 
self-sacrifice  natural  to  your  character,  so  energetically  and 
firmly  bore  that  to  which  you  regarded  yourself  as  called. 
You  gave  to  me  and  to  the  world  what  you  could  give,  and 
gave  much  motherly  love  and  self-sacrifice,  and  it  is  impossible 
not  to  value  you  for  it.  But  in  the  last  period  of  our  life,  for 
the  last  fifteen  years,  we  have  become  separated.  I  cannot 
think  that  I  am  to  blame,  because  I  know  that  I  have  changed 
not  for  my  own  sake  nor  for  that  of  men,  and  because  I  could 
not  act  otherwise. 

I  cannot  blame  you  for  not  following  me,  but  I  thank  you, 
and  with  love  I  remember  and  shall  remember  you  for  what 
you  have  given  me.    Farewell,  dear  Sonya. 

Your  loving, 
Leo  Tolstoy. 

[Letters  to  Wife,  pp.  524-26.] 

But  Tolstoy's  strength  was  still  insuflScient,  and  he 
remained  at  home  in  the  old  compromising  circumstances. 

He  gave  the  letter  to  a  friend,  charging  him  to  deliver  it 
to  his  wife  after  his  death.  Consciousness  of  his  weakness 


^ee  TOLSTOY 

never  left  him.  In  1882  he  had  written  in  his  tract  On 
Non-Resistance  to  Evil  by  Evil  (Letter  to  N.  N.):  "If  I 
know  the  road  home  and  walk  along  it  drunken,  tottering 
from  side  to  side,  does  that  prove  that  the  path  along 
which  I  am  walking  is  not  the  true  one?"  And  in  Feb- 
ruary, 1884,  he  wrote  to  his  wife:  "I  read  Montaigne, 
go  snowshoeing  to  no  purpose,  but  get  very  tired,  make 
shoes  and  think,  and  try  to  injure  no  one.  I  do  not 
even  try  to  do  anything  useful  for  others,  it  is  so  im- 
possibly difficult."*  At  last,  in  his  eighty- third  year, 
he  summoned  up  his  resolution  to  take  the  great  step, 
and  he  left  home  on-  the  journey  that  closed  with  his 
death. 

All  this  history  Tolstoy  strove  to  clothe  in  artistic 
form  in  the  drama  And  the  Light  Shineth  in  Darkness,  on 
which  he  worked  in  1900  and  1902.  This  work  he  never 
completed,  but  it  was  published  in  fragmentary  form 
after  his  death.  Here  he  depicts  the  struggles  of  an 
elderly  landed  proprietor,  whose  aspirations  are  the 
same  as  his  own,  with  the  apathy  and  passive  resistance 
of  his  family.  The  piece  is  perhaps  the  only  failure 
among  all  Tolstoy's  works  of  art  inspired  by  the  life 
about  him;  he  could  not  or  would  not  make  his  double 
a  hero,  and  he  fails  to  make  him  even  a  pathetic  figure. 

Tolstoy's  aversion  to  the  life  of  the  wealthy,  and  to 
money  and  property  in  general,  was  strengthened  by 
his  hfe  in  Moscow.  In  1881  his  eldest  son,  Sergey, 
was  ready  to  enter  the  university;  and  the  Countess 

*  Letters  to  Wife,  pp.  5^16,  217. 


LIFE:    1878-1910  267 

desired  better  educational  advantages  for  the  othel? 
children  as  well.  In  September  of  that  year  the  family 
moved  to  Moscow  and  settled  in  a  rented  house;  in  the 
next  year  they  bought  a  permanent  residence  there.  Life 
in  the  city  brought  Tolstoy  face  to  face  with  the  prob- 
lem of  poverty  in  a  totally  different  form  from  that  which 
he  had  known  in  the  country.  Hitherto  he  had  felt 
merely  that  his  own  life  lacked  meaning;  now  his  eyes 
were  opened  to  the  ills  of  society,  and  he  met  men  who 
sympathized  with  his  own  point  of  view.  On  October  17, 
1881,  he  noted  in  his  diary: 

A  month  has  passed.  The  most  torturing  in  my  life.  The 
move  to  Moscow.  All  are  settling  themselves,  but  when  will 
they  begin  to  live?  All  is  done  not  in  order  to  live,  but  in 
order  to  act  like  other  people.    And  there  is  no  life. 

Stink,  stones,  luxury,  beggar  hood,  vice.  Villains  have 
gathered  together,  who  have  plundered  the  people;  they 
have  gathered  soldiers  and  judges  in  order  to  protect  their 
orgies,  and — they  feast.  The  common  people  have  nothing 
further  to  do  than,  taking  advantage  of  the  passions  of  these 
men,  to  coax  back  from  them  what  has  been  plundered  from 
themselves.  The  peasant  men  are  the  more  clever  at  this. 
The  women  stay  at  home;  the  men  rub  floors  and  bodies  in 
bath  houses  and  serve  as  coachmen. — [Biryukov:  II,  401.] 

These  scattered  phrases  contain  the  essential  idea  of 
What  Shall  We  Do  Then? 

Tolstoy  spent  his  time  partly  in  literary  work;  then 
he  would  relieve  his  feelings  by  walking  outside  Moscow 
and  sawing  and  sphtting  wood  with  peasants.    He  found 


268  TOLSTOY 

true  joy  in  his  acquaintance  with  the  peasant  sectarian 
Syutayev.  This  man  had  abandoned  his  trade  as  a 
stone-cutter  in  St.  Petersburg,  and  had  moved  to  the 
village,  where  he  had  taken  the  humble  post  of  herds- 
man, wishing  to  do  good  even  to  animals.  He  and  his 
family  rejected  the  church,  disapproved  of  military 
service,  shared  their  goods  in  common,  and  endeavored 
to  guide  their  lives  by  the  precepts  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment, by  non-resistance  and  by  love.  The  living  sincerity 
of  Syutayev  was  an  inspiration  to  Tolstoy;  here  was  a 
man  who  had  really  altered  his  life  from  religious  con- 
viction. 

It  was  at  this  time  that  Tolstoy  took  up  the  study  of 
the  Hebrew  language.  With  the  aid  of  a  Jewish  friend. 
Rabbi  Minor  (compare  p.  237),  he  made  rapid  progress 
in  it.  Reading  only  the  portions  that  interested  him, 
he  went  through  the  Old  Testament  as  far  as  Isaiah. 

Of  his  life  in  Moscow,  and  the  conclusions  to  which 
it  led  him,  Tolstoy  gives  an  account  in  What  Shall  We  Do 
Then?,  written  in  1886,  four  years  after  the  events  that 
it  records.  In  this  powerful  book,  part  autobiography 
and  part  sociological  speculation,  he  naturally  shows 
the  same  point  of  view  as  in  My  Religion  (1884).  Yet 
the  book  makes  a  far  different  appeal.  Tolstoy's  argu- 
ment is  of  a  sort  more  cogent  with  men  of  this  genera- 
tion: he  is  not  citing  Gospel  texts,  to  which  he  attaches 
a  mandatory  power,  or,  appealing  to  the  abstract  moral 
sense  of  man;  he  is  picturing  actual  social  conditions 
and  demanding  that  they  be  changed.     Only  the  title 


LIFE:    1878-1910  £6d 

is  biblical;  it  is  taken  from  Luke  iii,  10,  the  question 
that  the  people  asked  of  John  the  Baptist,  when  he 
bade  them  prepare  the  way  of  the  Lord. 

On  the  negative  side  What  Shall  We  Do  Then?  is  a 
social  tract  of  marvelous  power.  Tolstoy,  like  Jacob 
Riis,  in  How  the  Other  Half  Lives,  or  like  hundreds  of 
lesser  writers  in  American  ten-cent  magazines  and 
sociological  reports,  simply  tells  of  conditions  as  he  has 
seen  them.  But  Tolstoy  is  a  writer  of  genius  and  in  his 
picture  of  slum  conditions  he  shows  the  same  mastery 
as  in  his  drawing  of  the  ball-room  or  the  hospital.  And 
moral  fervor  gives  to  his  denunciation  of  the  pagan 
world  of  modern  society  an  eloquence  like  that  of  St. 
Paul. 

Stirred  by  the  suffering  that  he  beheld,  Tolstoy  tried 
to  start  a  sort  of  informal  charitable  organization,  and 
in  January,  1882,  issued  a  public  appeal  to  society. 
On  the  Census  in  Moscow.  The  coming  census  offered 
an  opportunity  for  the  census-takers  to  become  ac- 
quainted with  city  conditions  and  to  help  the  poor. 
They  could  wisely  distribute  alms  that  would  be  con- 
tributed by  the  kind-hearted  rich.  After  the  census 
they  would  remain  in  touch  with  the  poor  and  aid 
them  by  work  rather  than  by  money;  they  would  be- 
come brothers  to  the  poor.  Through  the  united  efforts 
of  society  poverty  would  be  abolished. 

But  the  scheme  failed.  The  rich  were  apathetic. 
Tolstoy  himself  was  a  poor  worker.  "On  the  first  day 
appointed  the  student  census-takers  started  at  dawn,  but 


270  TOLSTOY 

I,  the  benefactor,  joined  them  about  noon.  I  could  not 
come  earher,  because  I  got  up  at  ten,  then  drank  my 
coffee  and  smoked,  waiting  for  digestion  to  take  place."* 
•Furthermore,  the  distribution  of  charitable  funds 
proved  to  be  useless  without  an  alteration  in  the  life- 
conception  of  the  people  who  were  to  receive  them. 
And  this  life-conception,  on  examination,  was  found  to  be 
exactly  the  same  as  that  of  the  rich  who  gave  the  funds. 
Tolstoy  was  horrified  when  he  found  a  prostitute  bent 
on  bringing  up  her  daughter  to  her  own  trade.  Re- 
flection convinced  him,  however,  that  the  prostitute  was 
acting  in  precisely  the  same  fashion  as  the  ladies  of  his 
own  acquaintance: 

This  daughter  may  be  taken  by  force  from  the  mother, 
but  the  mother  cannot  be  convinced  that  she  is  doing  evil 
by  selling  her  daughter.  If  there  was  any  one  to  save,  it 
was  this  woman,  the  mother;  above  all  she  must  be  saved 
from  that  view  of  life,  approved  by  every  one,  according  to 
which  a  woman  may  live  without  marriage,  that  is  without  the 
bearing  of  children  and  without  work,  serving  only  the  grati- 
fication of  sensuality.  If  I  had  thought  about  this,  then  I 
should  have  understood  that  the  majority  of  those  ladies 
whom  I  wished  to  send  here  for  the  saving  of  that  girl,  not  only 
themselves  live  without  the  bearing  of  children  and  without 
work,  serving  only  the  gratification  of  sensuality,  but  even 
consciously  educate  their  little  girls  for  this  very  life:  one 
mother  takes  her  daughter  to  the  tavern,  another  to  the 
court  or  to  balls.  But  both  mothers  have  one  and  the  same 
life-conception,  namely,  that  woman  should  gratify  the  lust 
♦  What  Shall  We  Do  Then?,  ch.  5. 


LIFE:     1878-1910  271 

of  man  and  that  for  this  she  should  be  fed,  clothed,  and 
pitied.  So  how  shall  our  ladies  correct  this  woman  and  her 
daughter?— [PFto  ShaU  We  Do  Then?,  eh.  8.] 

Tolstoy  himself  took  a  boy  from  the  slums  into  his  own 
kitchen,  but  the  lad  ungratefully  ran  away  and  joined  a 
circus.  The  boy  had  discovered  the  possibility  of  a  merry 
life  without  work;  he  would  neither  stay  with  Tolstoy 
nor  work  with  Syutayev,  the  peasant,  who  offered  him  a 
place  in  his  own  family: 

I  might  have  understood  how  silly  it  was  for  me,  who  was 
educating  my  own  children  in  the  most  complete  idleness 
and  luxury,  to  be  correcting  other  people  and  their  children, 
who  were  perishing  from  idleness  in  the  Rzhanov  house,  which 
I  called  a  den,  but  in  which  nevertheless  three  quarters  of  the 
inmates  worked  for  themselves  and  for  others.  But  I  under- 
stood nothing  of  this. — (Ch.  9.J 

Syutayev  opened  Tolstoy's  eyes  to  his  error.  Tolstoy 
must  first  reform  himself  before  he  tried  to  correct 
others;  he  must  become  a  laborer,  a  brother  to  his 
fellow  men,  and  so  infect  them  with  his  own  view  of 
life.    This  is  Syutayev's  solution  of  the  problem: 

"Let  us  divide  them  [the  idle  folk  of  the  slums]  up  between 
us.  I  am  not  rich,  but  I  will  at  once  take  two.  You  took 
a  lad  into  your  kitchen;  I  invited  him  to  join  me,  but  he  did 
not  come.  Let  there  be  ten  times  as  many;  we  will  divide 
them  all  up.  You  will  take  some,  and  I  will  take  some.  We 
will  go  and  work  together;  he  will  see  how  I  work,  will  learn 
how  to  live,  and  we  will  sit  down  to  the  bowl  together  at 


'^n  TOLSTOY 

one  table,  and  he  will  hear  a  word  from  me  and  from  you. 
That  is  charity,  but  that  society  of  yours  is  mere  folly." — 
[Ch.  14.] 

The  idle  rich,  supported  by  the  labor  of  the  poor  and  set- 
ting them  the  example  of  a  useless  and  dissolute  life,  are 
the  cause  of  the  continued  existence  of  poverty.  Tolstoy 
is  one  of  this  class,  and  is  personally  responsible  for 
the  misery  of  the  Moscow  slums.  The  clean,  educated, 
luxurious  rich  can  never  help  the  poor. 

Tolstoy  now  proceeds  to  examine  the  nature  of  money 
itself,  the  symbol  of  wealth.  Money,  he  finds,  is  only 
incidentally  a  medium  of  exchange;  it  is  primarily  an 
instrument  of  oppression,  by  means  of  which  a  small 
number  of  men  make  slaves  of  all  the  rest.  In  early 
times  conquerors  made  slaves  of  men  subjugated  in 
battle;  later  feudal  lords  made  slaves  of  men  by  seizing 
their  lands;  now  the  government,  by  the  collection  of 
taxes,  forces  men  into  a  third,  financial  slavery.  For 
in  order  to  raise  money  to  pay  taxes  Russian  peasants 
are  obliged  to  leave  their  own  lands  and  work  on  those 
of  the  neighboring  proprietors,  or,  worse  yet,  to  go  to 
the  city  and  work  in  factories: 

So  evident  is  this,  that  if  the  government  would  only  make 
the  experiment  for  a  year  of  not  collecting  direct,  indirect, 
and  land  taxes,  all  the  work  on  other  men's  fields  and  in  the 
factories  would  cease.  Nine-tenths  of  the  Russian  people 
hire  themselves  out  during  the  time  of  the  collection  of  taxes 
and  to  raise  money  for  taxes. — [Ch.  20.] 


LIFE:    1878-1910  273 

The  use  of  money  to  alleviate  poverty  only  increases 
the  evil.  What  then  can  be  the  real  cure?  It  is  that 
indicated  by  Syutayev,  and  has  two  stages.  A  man 
must  first  be  honest  with  himself  and  recognize  that  he 
is  supported  in  idleness  by  the  labor  of  others;  that 
men  and  women  are  toiling  at  injurious  trades  in  order 
to  maintain  him  in  luxury.  Conscious  of  his  guilt,  he 
will  seek  to  escape  from  it,  not  by  distributing  a  portion 
of  his  ill-gotten  gains,  but  by  ceasing  to  depend  upon 
others.  He  will  support  himself,  will  engage  in  manual 
labor,  will  live  a  simple  life  in  the  country  instead  of  a 
luxurious  life  in  the  city.  Others,  imitating  him,  will 
likewise  take  up  a  simple  life,  tilling  the  soil.  Some  men, 
with  a  talent  for  metal  work  or  for  teaching,  will  make 
plowshares  or  teach  the  children  of  the  community 
instead  of  plowing  and  reaping.  But  their  activity  will 
be  recognized  as  necessary  by  the  whole  community, 
nor  will  it  lead  to  any  distinctions  of  property.  Gradually 
the  whole  world  will  adopt  this  mode  of  life,  luxury  and 
government  will  disappear,  and  men  and  women  will  be 
once  more  free  and  equal. 

To  this  book  Tolstoy  appends  eloquent  pages  in- 
culcating on  women  the  duty  of  childbearing,  as  on 
men  that  of  labor.  The  logical  connection  is  not  obvious, 
except  that  in  each  case  he  preaches  a  revolt  against  the 
luxurious,  self-indulgent  habits  of  modern  society. 

Thus  in  What  Shall  We  Do  Then?  Tolstoy  temporarily 
lays  aside  his  ideal  of  pious  mendicancy  and  inculcates 
useful  work  for  society;  he  is  guided  not  by  the  ascetic 


274  TOLSTOY 

impulse,  but  by  love.  His  ethic  is  to  a  certaia  extent 
world-affirming  instead  of  world-renouncing.  Through 
fixing  his  attention  on  social  conditions  instead  of  on 
personal  conduct  he  is  unconsciously  driven  into  a 
compromise  position,  one  that  we  may  define  as  Christian 
anarchy. 

Tolstoy's  diagnosis  of  the  causes  of  modern  conditions 
and  his  proposed  remedy  for  them  are  as  inadequate  as 
his  presentation  of  the  ills  of  modern  society  was  masterly. 
Even  in  Russia  taxation  has  been  but  a  minor  factor 
in  determining  the  rise  of  modern  industrialism  and  city 
life;  in  other  countries  the  part  played  by  taxation 
has  been  of  still  less  account.  Money  has  made  possible 
modern  conditions,  but  it  was  devised  centuries  before 
they  arose;  to  say  that  money  is  primarily  a  means  of 
oppression  is  as  absurd  as  to  say  the  same  thing  of  steam 
or  electricity.  Neither  money  nor  steel  knives  are 
bad  in  themselves,  though  they  may  be  put  to  evil  uses. 

It  is  a  striking  fact  that  in  this  work  Tolstoy  pays 
little  attention  to  the  industrial  conditions  that  are 
shaping  modern  society,  and  yet  shows  clearly  the  in- 
fluence of  modern  socialistic  thought,  with  which  he 
may  have  become  acquainted  through  his  friend  the 
ex-revolutionist  Alekseyev.  His  three  stages  of  slavery, 
personal  slavery,  land  slavery,  and  taxation  slavery, 
suggest  those  of  Karl  Marx.  But  for  the  wage  slavery 
of  Marx,  of  which  he  has  small  personal  knowledge,  he 
substitutes  taxation  slavery,  of  which  he  has  watched 
the  dire  effects  on  his  peasant  neighbors.     And,  while 


LIFE:    1878-1910  £75 

the  Socialists  concentrate  their  attention  on  problems  of 
the  production  of  wealth,  Tolstoy  considers  rather  the 
problem  of  consumption.  By  limiting  his  consumption, 
by  simplifying  his  life,  a  man  will  benefit  society  more 
efficiently  than  by  increasing  his  production  through 
the  use  of  machines. 

If  Tolstoy  had  never  formally  abjured  his  doctrine 
of  the  impotence  of  the  individual  man  to  influence 
historic  events,  he  had  ceased  to  emphasize  it,  had 
indeed  forgotten  it.  This  is  strikingly  seen  in  the  remedy 
here  proposed  for  existing  ills,  in  which  we  reach  the 
ultimate  limit  of  Tolstoy's  individualism.  Once  he  had 
denied  the  possibility  of  progress  in  history,  but  had  ad- 
mitted it  for  the  individual  man.  Now,  opening  his 
eyes,  he  sees  that  the  perfected  human  character  may 
become  an  object  of  imitation  by  others,  and  that 
thereby  the  structure  of  society  may  be  modified,  may 
become  Christian  instead  of  pagan,  altruistic  instead  of 
predatory.  What  the  man  of  action  like  Napoleon 
could  not  accomplish  the  humble  peasant  sectarian  may 
perform.  This  is  a  buoyant  individualism  like  that  of 
Emerson.  "Gods  are  we,  bards,  saints,  heroes,  if  we 
will!" 

In  this  remedy  for  modern  ills  may  be  seen  not  only 
Tolstoy's  uncompromising  individuaHsm,  but  also  his 
aversion  to  artificial  civilization,  his  passion  for  the 
return  to  nature,  for  life  next  the  soil  and  in  the  free 
air.  A  temperamental  instinct  has  now  become  a 
religious  duty. 


^76  TOLSTOY 

The  weakness  of  Tolstoy's  remedy  is  seen  in  its 
essentially  reactionary  character,  and  in  its  exclusive 
insistence  on  the  moral  life,  to  the  neglect  of  other 
sides  of  human  existence;  or,  to  put  the  same  thing 
more  exactly,  in  its  insistence  on  a  narrow  and  unsound 
ethical  ideal. 

Tolstoy  had  constantly  denied  the  value  of  material 
progress  and  had  hated  external  civilization,  so  that  he 
contemplated  with  equanimity  the  sloughing  off  of  such 
institutions  as  railroads  and  printing-presses.  He  was 
a  kindred  spirit  to  his  English  contemporary  Ruskin. 
Ruskin  had  found  modern  machine-made  goods  unlovely, 
and  so  had  been  brought  to  a  study  of  their  production 
and  to  a  yearning  for  the  revival  of  simpler  industrial 
conditions  that  did  not  crush  the  worker.  Tolstoy  had 
found  city  conditions  morally  vicious  and  so  had  longed 
for  their  abolition  through  the  growth  of  a  new  social 
consciousness.  Each  man  preached  a  gospel  of  simpli- 
fication. Each  thereby  placed  himself  in  opposition  to 
the  current  of  modern  history,  which  tends  to  more 
diversified  wants,  to  cooperation  in  industry,  to  speciaH- 
zation.  Tolstoy  was  the  more  extreme.  He  lacked  the 
saving  common  sense  of  his  master  Rousseau,  who, 
despairing  of  a  return  of  mankind  to  a  happy  bar- 
barism, wished  to  organize  civilization  on  the  basis  of 
justice — to  see  that  the  new  conditions  should  not 
hamper  the  development  of  the  individual.  The  aim  of 
all  constructive  reformers,  of  whatever  type,  notably  of 
the  Socialists,  has  been  to  introduce  justice,  equality 


LIFE:    1878-1910  277 

of  opportunity,  into  the  social  order.  Tolstoy,  a  voice 
crying  in  the  wilderness,  is  almost  alone  among  great 
men  of  our  time  in  his  wish  to  destroy  the  material 
advances  that  mankind  has  made. 

To  this  pitch  of  enthusiasm — let  us  frankly  term  it 
absurdity — ^Tolstoy  was  brought  by  his  concentration 
on  the  moral  life  of  the  individual  man.  He  views 
men  as  wholes;  a  man  who  does  not  lead  a  moral, 
that  is,  a  self-sacrificing  life,  can  accomplish  no  good 
in  the  world.  Thus  he  ridiculed  the  Russian  political 
exiles  because  their  lives  were  often  selfish  and  licen- 
tious, and  he  mocked  at  his  literary  associates  for  the 
same  reason.  But  men  of  common  sense  do  not  judge 
a  ballot-reform  law  by  the  private  life  of  its  framer,  or 
condemn  one  of  Poe's  poems  because  of  its  author's 
moral  weakness.  Life  is  not  all  morality,  or  at  least  not 
all  self-abnegation.  If  dry  and  sanitary  houses,  pure 
water,  clean  streets,  knowledge  of  what  is  taking  place 
in  the  world  about  us,  are  not  worthy  objects  of  am- 
bition, then  Tolstoy  may  be  right  in  his  insistence  on  his 
peculiar  type  of  ascetic,  altruistic  morality.  But  common 
sense  will  suspect  that  an  ethical  doctrine  that  leads 
to  contempt  for  such  things  is  fallacious,  and  common 
sense  will  be  confirmed  by  ethical  theory.  Tolstoy's 
ethical  and  social  writings  are  eloquent  and  stirring, 
but  they  are  based  on  premises  that  we  must  admit 
are  unsound. 

Naturally  Tolstoy  tried  to  carry  out  in  his  own  life 
the  ideal  of  self-sacrificing  physical  labor  that  he  had 


278  TOLSTOY 

formed.  He  toiled  in  the  fields  with  his  peasants: 
Repin's  picture  of  the  stalwart  old  man  trudging  behind 
the  plow  has  become  familiar  to  us.  He  learned  the 
cobbler's  trade,  but  so  poorly  that  the  boots  he  made 
"couldn't  be  worse."*  He  built  a  stove  for  a  peasant, 
with  similar  ill  success. f  But  as  his  years  advanced, 
and  his  physical  strength  declined,  he  gradually  ceased 
from  labors  in  the  fields. 

In  this  behavior  men  are  accustomed  to  see  something 
of  the  mountebank,  and  perhaps  the  reproach  is  to 
some  small  degree  just.  Possibly  there  was  in  it  just  a 
suspicion  of  that  yearning  for  admiration  which  Tolstoy 
confesses  was  one  of  his  distinguishing  traits.  But  it  is 
better  to  regard  it  as  the  pathetic  effort  of  a  great  man 
to  realize  his  own  ideal  in  actual  life,  however  im- 
perfectly and  poorly  he  might  do  so.  The  work  was  good 
for  him,  even  if  it  did  not  benefit  the  recipients.  It  was 
valuable  for  the  spirit  of  brotherly  love  behind  it, 
which  was  real  and  sincere.  Similarly  Tolstoy,  who  dis- 
approved of  money  alms  in  principle,  continued  to  give 
them,  in  order  to  cultivate  better  feelings  in  him- 
self, and  because  his  family  still  enjoyed  the  use  of  his 
property. 

Of  course  this  queer  exterior,  these  external  traits, 
were  easily  imitated  by  the  disciples,  many  of  them  mere 
soft-headed  cranks,  who  now  began  to  flock  to  Yasnaya 
Polyana.  Had  Tolstoy  desired  to  found  a  religious 
sect,  there  might  easily  have  grown  up  a  Tolstoyan 
*  Maude:  II,  347,  f  Ihid.,  II,  227, 


LIFE:    1878-1910  279 

ritual  of  plowing  and  boot-making.  But  he  had  no  such 
desire.  "My  father  had  good  reason  for  saying,"  his 
son  writes  in  his  Reminiscences  (p.  302),  "that  the 
*Tolstoyites*  were  to  him  the  most  incomprehensible 
sect  and  the  furthest  removed  from  his  way  of  thinking 
that  he  had  ever  come  across.  *I  shall  soon  be  dead/ 
he  sadly  predicted,  *and  people  will  say  that  Tolstoy 
taught  men  to  plow  and  reap  and  make  boots;  while 
the  chief  thing  that  I  have  been  trying  so  hard  to  say 
all  my  life,  the  thing  I  believe  in,  the  most  important  of 
all,  they  will  forget.'" 

Beyond  certain  limits  Tolstoy  never  carried  the 
application  of  his  teaching.  He  claimed  the  right,  for 
example,  to  have  a  quiet  room  in  which  to  do  his  writing,* 
though  he  must  have  seen  that  even  this  modest  luxury 
was  inconsistent  with  his  scheme  of  life.  He  never 
even  tried  to  learn  how  to  prepare  his  own  food.  His 
wife  cared  for  him  most  tenderly,  adapting  the  kitchen 
to  his  wants  when  in  1885  he  became  a  vegetarian. 
Separation  from  such  care  was  not  good  for  him.  His 
son  Ilya,  who  was  strongly  affected  by  his  father's 
teaching  and  was  trying  to  live  the  simple  life  with  his 
wife,  tells  amusingly  of  a  visit  from  his  father: 

My  father  helped  us  as  well  as  he  could,  but  I  must  confess, 
I  came  to  the  conclusion  that  he  was  extremely  little  fitted 
for  the  Robinson  Crusoe  life.  It  is  true  that  he  was  not  at  all 
exacting,  and  always  vowed  that  everything  was  first  rate. 
But  habit  told — he  had  been  accustomed  for  so  many  years 
*  Maude:  II,  528, 


280  TOLSTOY 

to  a  particular  order  of  life,  a  particular  diet,  that  every 
departure  from  that  order,  even  when  he  was  only  sixty,  had 
a  disastrous  effect  on  his  health.  It  happened  again  and 
again  that  when  he  had  gone  away  quite  healthy  from  home 
and  found  himself  in  new  conditions,  he  came  back  ill;  even 
when  he  had  been  staying  with  people  who  knew  all  his  habits 
and  looked  after  him  like  a  little  child. — [Reminiscences  of 
Tolstoy,  pp.  331,  332.] 

Tolstoy  was  now  a  changed  man;  his  aristocratic 
aloofness  had  vanished  and  he  became  accessible  to  all 
visitors,  ready  to  give  counsel  when  asked,  yet  never 
forcing  it  on  his  guests.  With  young  and  old  alike, 
with  the  ignorant  and  with  the  learned,  he  was  ready  to 
talk  on  the  most  intimate  questions  of  the  soul  and  of 
private  conduct.  Yet  on  the  least  hint  of  compulsion 
the  old  aristocratic  pride  would  reassert  itself.  His 
brother  Sergey,  quoted  by  Count  Ilya  Tolstoy,  describes 
him  well: 

**He  is  always  preaching  humility  and  non-resistance,  but 
he  is  proud  for  all  that.  Md,shenka's  sister  had  a  footman 
called  Forna.  When  he  got  drunk  he  used  to  get  under  the 
staircase,  tuck  up  his  legs  and  lie  down.  One  day  they  came 
and  told  him  that  the  Countess  was  calling  him.  *She  can 
come  here  and  look  for  me  if  she  wants  me,'  he  answered. 
L^vochka  [pet  name  for  Lev,  Leo]  is  just  the  same.  When 
Dolgoruky  [Governor-General  of  Moscow]  sent  his  chief  secre- 
tary Istomin  to  ask  him  to  come  and  have  a  talk  with  him 
about  Syutayev  the  sectarian,  do  you  know  what  he  answered? 
*I^t  him  come  here,  if  he  wants  me/   Jsn't  that  just  like  Forna? 


LIFE:    1878-1910  ^81 

No,  L^vochka  is  very  proud;  nothing  would  induce  him 
to  go;  and  he  was  quite  right;  but  it's  no  good  talking  of 
humility."— [^^^<^.,  PP-  185,  186.] 

When  his  new  conception  of  life  had  been  fully  formed, 
Tolstoy  recovered  his  former  gaiety  of  spirits.  Biryukov 
writes  of  him: 

Some  people  have  made  a  great  mistake  in  supposing  that 
the  new,  religious  framfe  of  mind  of  Lev  Nikoldyevich  finds 
its  expression  in  gloom  and  sorrow.  Such  were  only  moments 
of  acute  struggle  with  the  temptations  that  surrounded  him. 
But  as  soon  as  his  spiritual  equilibrium  was  reestablished.  Lev 
Nikoldyevich  would  assume  a  kindly,  gay,  joyous  tone  that 
infected  all  those  about  him  with  irrepressible  gaiety. — [Biryu- 
k6v:  n,  435.] 

The  wholesome  and  kindly  home  life  was  not  de- 
stroyed. An  institution  of  the  family  was  the  letter-box, 
into  which  each  member  dropped  compositions,  jokes, 
and  verses,  which  were  read  aloud  on  the  following 
Sunday.  Naturally  the  father's  contributions  were  the 
best.  The  following  is  a  portrait  of  himseK,  taken  from  a 
Bulletin  of  the  Patients  at  Ydsnaya  Polydna  Lunatic 
Asylum: 

No.  1.  Sanguine  complexion.  One  of  the  harmless  sort. 
The  patient  is  subject  to  the  mania  known  to  German  lunatic 
doctors  as  Weltverhesserungswahn.  The  patient's  hallucina- 
tion consists  in  thinking  that  you  can  change  other  people's 
lives  by  words.  General  symptoms:  discontent  with  all  the 
existing  order  of  things;    condemnation  of  every  one  except 


282  TOLSTOY 

himself,  and  irritable  garrulity  quite  irrespective  of  his  au- 
dience; frequent  transitions  from  fury  and  irritability  to  an 
unnatural  tearful  sentimentality.  Special  symptoms:  busy- 
ing himself  with  unsuitable  occupations,  such  as  cleaning 
and  making  boots,  mowing  hay,  etc.  Treatment:  complete 
indifference  of  all  surrounding  the  patient  to  what  he  says; 
occupations  designed  to  use  up  all  his  energy. — [Count  Ilya 
Tolstoy:  Reminiscences  oj  Tolstoy,  p.  162.] 

Towards  the  end  of  1891  Tolstoy  was  brought  face 
to  face  with  a  great  conflict  between  his  principles  and 
actual  conditions.  To  his  honor  be  it  said,  he  neglected 
his  principles  in  order  to  render  more  eflicient  service 
to  humanity.  In  the  summer  of  1891  a  severe  famine 
broke  out  in  central  and  eastern  Russia,  but  it  was  ig- 
nored by  the  Russian  government.  Tolstoy,  when  from 
a  personal  visit  to  one  of  the  suffering  districts  he  had 
seen  the  destitution  of  the  peasants,  determined  to  do 
what  he  could  to  relieve  them.  In  November  he  went 
to  the  estate  of  his  friend  Rayevsky,  at  Begichevka,  a 
village  in  the  province  of  Ryazan,  some  hundred  miles 
from  his  own  home,  and  remained  there  at  work,  with 
some  intervals,  until  July,  1893.  Not  only  he  himself 
but  his  wife  and  sons  and  daughters  threw  themselves 
into  the  work.  He  published  articles  setting  forth  the 
needs  of  the  population  and  the  ineflSciency  of  the  gov- 
ernment's action,  and  the  Countess  inserted  in  the  Mos- 
cow newspapers  an  appeal  for  money  contributions. 
Funds  began  to  flow  in  from  Russia  and  from  abroad,  and 
soon  Tolstoy,  the  anarchistic  scorner  of  cooperation. 


LIFE:    1878-1910  283 

found  himself  at  the  head  of  a  tolerably  large  philan- 
thropic organization.  His  reports  on  the  work  done  show 
a  shrewd  practical  sense  and  knowledge  of  peasant 
ways  in  the  precautions  taken  to  prevent  the  giving  of 
aid  to  peasants  able  to  help  themselves.  In  the  use 
of  charitable  funds,  as  his  son  tells  us,  Tolstoy  was 
cautious  and  even  parsimonious.  His  plan  was  to 
make  no  house  to  house  distribution  of  supplies,  but 
to  establish  eating-houses  to  which  the  needy  must 
come  for  relief.  Only  those  in  real  want  would  resort 
to  these  simple  restaurants.  In  his  report  for  July, 
1892,  he  gives  the  number  of  eating-houses  under  his 
charge  as  246,  at  which  from  ten  to  thirteen  thousand 
persons  were  fed.  Besides  this  he  had  established  124 
"children's  shelters,"  at  which  from  two  to  three  thou- 
sand children  were  fed  with  milk  porridge.  He  also  had 
charge  of  the  distribution  of  firewood,  of  flax  and 
bast  for  work,  of  horses  for  ruined  farms,  of  potatoes, 
oats,  and  other  seed  for  sowing,  of  the  sale  of  baked 
bread  at  low  prices,  and  of  the  feeding  of  the  peasants' 
horses.  Visitors  to  the  famine  districts  give  accounts 
of  the  unselfish  personal  service  done  by  Tolstoy  and 
his  family.  The  peasants  venerated  the  Count,  though 
the  priests  were  meanwhile  denouncing  him  as  Antichrist. 
Tolstoy's  success  in  this  experiment  at  practical 
philanthropy  makes  one  wish  that  his  energy  had  more 
often  taken  this  course,  instead  of  being  diverted  into 
whimsical  by-paths.  But  each  man  must  follow  his 
own  genius.    Tolstoy  fretted  at  the  part  he  was  play- 


284  TOLSTOY 

ing.  "I  am  living  miserably,"  he  wrote  to  Feinermann 
in  December,  1891,  when  his  work  was  just  beginning. 
"I  do  not  know  myself  how  I  was  drawn  into  this 
work  of  feeding  the  hungry,  which  is  oppressive  to  me. 
It  is  not  for  me,  who  am  fed  by  them,  to  feed  them. 
But  I  have  been  so  drawn  in  that  I  have  become  a  dis- 
tributor of  the  vomit  thrown  up  by  the  rich.  I  feel 
that  this  is  miserable  and  disgusting,  but  I  cannot 
withdraw;  not  that  I  regard  this  as  necessary — I 
think  that  I  ought  to  withdraw,  but  I  have  not  the 
strength."*  In  the  following  February  he  wrote  to 
another  friend: 

It  is  a  surprising  thing!  If  I  still  had  any  doubts  whether 
or  not  it  were  possible  to  do  good  with  money,  then  now,  when 
I  am  buying  grain  with  money  and  feeding  some  thousands 
of  men,  I  have  become  perfectly  convinced  that  nothing  but 
evil  can  be  done  with  money. 

You  will  say:    "Why  then  do  you  continue  to  do  so?'* 

Because  I  cannot  tear  myself  away,  and  because  I  feel 
nothing  except  the  deepest  oppression,  and  so  think  that  I  am 
not  doing  this  for  the  satisfaction  of  my  personality. 

The  oppression  is  not  in  the  toil — the  toil  on  the  contrary 
is  joyous  and  draws  me  on — and  not  in  an  occupation  for 
which  I  feel  no  heart,  but  in  a  constant  inward  consciousness 
of  being  ashamed  of  myself. — [Letters,  collected  by  Sergeyenko 
and  edited  by  Gruzinsky  (Moscow,  1912) :  pp.  109,  110.] 

Love  and  asceticism  were  constantly  struggling  in 
Tolstoy *s  nature!     Despite  his  principles  Tolstoy  was 
^Letters,  collected  by  Sergeyenko  (Moscow,  1910) :  I,  208. 


LIFE:    1878-1910  285 

again  drawn  into  similar  work  of  famine  relief,  on  a 
smaller  scale,  in  company  with  his  son  Ilya,  in  the 
spring  of  1899.* 

Tolstoy's  impatience  with  business  details  is  amusing. 
On  May  1,  1892,  he  wrote  to  his  wife: 

Yesterday  I  was  again  at  work  writing  my  report;  reckoned 
up  the  accounts,  got  mixed,  tried  to  straighten  things  out, 
and,  it  seems,  did  so.  I  was  confused  mainly  by  not  knowing 
how  to  figure  up  accounts  and  keep  books;  and  we  have  not 
only  double  but  triple  book-keeping,  and  not  as  an  aid  to 
order,  but  to  disorder.  Finally  I  decided  to  reckon  up  how 
much  we  really  have  left  over,  and  then  how  much  we  have 
spent,  and  so  to  determine  how  much  we  received.  It  came 
out  almost  in  agreement  with  the  entries  of  receipts  that  we 
have  here. — [Letters  to  Wife,  p.  407.] 

This  is  from  the  man  who  had  written  in  1862,  in  his 
article  On  Popular  Education:  "It  seems  that  there  is 
no  need  of  proving  that  tenue  des  Itvres,  Buchhaltung, 
which  is  taught  in  Germany  and  England,  is  a  science 
that  requires  only  a  quarter  of  an  hour's  explanation 
for  any  pupil  who  knows  the  four  rules  of  arithmetic." 

Despite  his  intense  aversion  to  the  Russian  Church, 
Tolstoy  retained  a  certain  admiration  for  the  monastic 
life.  This  is  illustrated  by  his  repeated  pilgrimages  to 
the  Optin  Monastery  in  the  province  of  Kaluga,  some 
hundred  miles  from  Yasnaya  Polyana.  The  first  of 
*  Count  Ilya  Tolstoy:  Reminiscences  of  Tolstoy,  pp.  352-359. 


286  TOLSTOY 

these  was  in  1877,  when  he  was  still  a  member  of  the 
church;  the  second  he  made  on  foot,  in  1881,  dressed 
as  a  peasant  pilgrim,  and  accompanied  only  by  his 
servant  Arbuzov.  On  this  trip  he  was  shocked  to  see 
a  monk  offering  to  a  poor  woman,  who  had  asked  for 
the  Gospels,  a  description  of  the  monastery  in  place  of 
them;  he  forthwith  bought  a  copy  of  the  Gospels  and 
gave  it  to  the  woman.  When  his  identity  was  dis- 
covered the  archimandrite  insisted  that  he  be  lodged 
in  the  luxurious  hotel  instead  of  in  the  quarters  of  the 
common  pilgrims;  Tolstoy,  after  repeated  refusals,  con- 
sented. He  passed  four  hours  in  conversation  with 
Father  Ambrose,  the  celebrated  holy  man  of  the  monas- 
tery. Still  a  third  journey  was  made  in  1890,  largely 
for  a  visit  to  his  sister  Marya,  who  had  become  a  nun 
in  the  convent  at  Shamordino,  some  eight  miles  from 
the  Optin  Monastery. 

Tolstoy's  familiarity  with  monastic  life  is  attested 
by  his  posthumous  tale  Father  Sergy,  written  at  inter- 
vals from  1890  to  1898.  The  hero  of  this  story  is  a 
wealthy  young  aristocrat  who,  from  religious  convic- 
tion, has  entered  a  monastery  and  become  famous  for 
his  saintly  life.  Proud  of  his  own  fame,  he  succumbs  to 
the  temptation  of  a  girl  who  is  brought  into  his  cell  to 
be  healed.  Crushed  in  spirit,  he  wanders  forth  from 
the  monastery,  becomes  a  vagabond,  and  is  sent  to 
Siberia.  "In  Siberia  he  settled  in  a  hut  on  the  grounds 
of  a  rich  peasant  and  is  now  living  there.  He  works  in 
his   host's   garden,    teaches    children,    and    tends   the 


LIFE:    1878-1910  287 

sick."  The  theme,  that  of  the  danger  of  pride  in  one's 
own  moral  progress,  is  one  that  runs  through  all 
Tolstoy's  work. 

Tolstoy's  conversion,  though  it  estranged  him  from  his 
friend  Fet,  brought  into  his  circle  of  intimates  numbers 
of  men  who  sympathized  with  his  doctrines  and  who 
tried  to  realize  them  in  practice.  Freaks  of  all  sorts 
sought  his  acquaintance,  but  among  his  new  associates 
were  a  few  persons  of  considerable  force  of  character. 
Among  these  were  Vladimir  Chertkov  and  Pavel  Biryu- 
kov,  who  became  in  a  sense  his  literary  agents,  aiding 
in  the  pubHcation  abroad,  mainly  in  Switzerland  and 
England,  of  those  of  his  works  that  were  prohibited  in 
Russia.  (Biryukov  was  one  of  his  most  zealous  helpers 
in  the  famine  relief.)  They  were  instrumental  in  or- 
ganizing in  Russia  a  pubHshing  firm,  the  Mediator, 
which  aimed  to  furnish  cheap  literature  of  good  quality 
for  the  peasants.  Thanks  largely  to  the  cooperation  of 
a  Moscow  publisher  named  Sytin,  this  imdertaking  was 
a  practical  success.  For  it  Tolstoy  wrote  numerous 
tracts  and  stories,  and  other  authors  did  the  same. 
Biryukov  estimates  the  number  of  booklets  distributed 
by  the  firm  in  the  nineties  as  some  3,500,000  copies  a 
year.*  As  none  of  these  works  were  copyrighted,  re- 
prints of  them  were  frequent. 

No  such  success  attended  the  efforts  of  Tolstoy's 
disciples  to  organize  communities  in  which  they  should 
live  according  to  the  teachings  of  their  master.  The 
^Lije  of  Tolstoy  (London  and  New  York,  1911),  p.  104. 


i288  TOLSTOY 

associations  all  failed,  generally  through  internal  dis- 
sensions: Tolstoy  himseK,  who  was  not  a  Tolstoyan 
(compare  page  279),  apparently  never  attached  great 
importance  to  these  projects,  though  they  were  directly 
inspired  by  his  counsel  in  What  Shall  We  Do  Then?; 
he  took  no  part  in  founding  them.  Indeed  organization 
of  any  sort  was  abhorrent  to  Tolstoy's  nature,  which, 
as  has  already  been  repeatedly  emphasized,  was  fun- 
damentally individualistic.  This  may  be  illustrated  by 
quotations  from  his  Journal  for  December,  1897,  and 
January  and  February,  1898: 

I  had  a  talk  with  Dushan  [Dr.  Makovitsky,  later  Tolstoy*s 
companion  in  his  flight  from  home].  He  said  that  since  he  has 
become  involuntarily  my  representative  in  Hungary,  then 
how  was  he  to  act.  I  was  glad  for  the  opportunity  to  tell  him 
and  to  clarify  it  to  myself  that  to  speak  about  Tolstoyanism, 
to  seek  my  guidance,  to  ask  my  decision  on  problems,  is  a 
great  and  gross  mistake.  There  is  no  Tolstoyanism  and  has 
never  been,  nor  any  teaching  of  mine;  there  is  only  one  eternal, 
general,  universal  teaching  of  the  truth,  which  for  me,  for  us, 
is  especially  clearly  expressed  in  the  Gospels. — [The  Journal  of 
Leo  Tolstoy,  1895-1899,  translated  by  Strunsky:  pp.  178, 179.] 

Organization,  every  kind  of  organization,  which  frees  from 
any  kind  of  human,  personal,  moral  duties.  All  the  evil  in 
the  world  comes  from  this. — [Ibid.,  p.  195.] 

Fdresov  told  me  about  Malikov's  teaching.  All  this  was 
beautiful,  all  this  was  Christian:  be  perfect  like  your  Father; 
but  it  was  not  good  that  all  this  teaching  had  for  its  end 


LIFE:    1878-1910  289 

influence  over  people  and  not  inner  satisfaction,  not  an  answer 
to  the  problem  of  life.  Influence  on  others  is  the  main  Achilles' 
heel— [Ibid.,  p.  210.] 

Thus  Tolstoy  stoutly  resisted  every  attempt  of  his 
admirers  to  make  him  the  leader  of  a  sect.  In  1892  a 
group  of  his  disciples  formed  the  idea  of  calling  a  congress 
of  Tolstoyans  and  giving  some  organization  to  their  body. 
But  when  they  appealed  for  advice  to  Tolstoy  himself, 
he  advised  against  any  external  union;  each  man  should 
trust  the  promptings  of  his  own  spirit:  "By  what 
signs  am  I  to  find  out  that  I  am  destined  to  be  united 
with  Ivan  and  not  with  Peter,  or  not  with  a  horse- 
thief  from  Krapivo  or  with  the  Governor  of  Cher- 
nigov?" But  Feinermann,  who  tells  of  this  incident, 
adds: 

It  is  interesting  that  a  few  years  later  .  .  .  L.  N.  no  longer 
held  these  anti-communal  views,  but  spoke  of  the  necessity  of 
communal  life,  and  two  years  ago  [1910.'^]  when  in  St.  Peters- 
burg a  society  of  Free  Christians  was  founded,  and  their 
regulations  were  sent  to  L.  N.,  he  replied  with  full  agreement 
to  the  organization  of  the  new  community.  The  spirit  of  L.  N. 
grew  in  deep  sincerity,  and  what  at  the  first  glance  seems  a 
contradiction  is  really  a  sign  of  life. — [Teneromo,  Living  Words 
of  L.  N,  Tolstoy,  p.  255.] 

In  1895  members  of  a  Russian  sectarian  body,  the 
Dukhobors,  under  the  influence  of  the  Tolstoyan  teach- 
ing, which  they  had  received  through  their  exiled 
leader,  Verigin,  publicly  burned  the  arms  that  they  were 


290  TOLSTOY 

carrying  as  members  of  the  Russian  army.  In  return 
they  were  flogged  by  Cossacks  and  subjected  to  cruel 
persecution.  They  attracted  the  attention  of  Tolstoy 
and  his  followers,  who  found  their  beliefs  remarkably 
consonant  with  their  own,  and  who  obtained  from  the 
Russian  authorities  permission  for  them  to  leave  Russia. 
The  Canadian  government  was  willing  to  provide  lands 
for  them  as  immigrants,  but  funds  were  lacking  for  the 
expenses  of  the  trip  to  Canada.  To  aid  in  securing  these, 
Tolstoy  took  from  his  chest  Resurrection,  a  novel  begun 
some  years  before,  completed  it,  and  sold  it  to  Marx,  a 
prominent  Russian  publisher,  who  printed  it  in  1899. 
To  do  work  for  money  involved  Tolstoy  in  a  com- 
promise with  his  conscience,  but  in  this  instance  he 
decided  that  the  end  justified  the  means.  Marx  offered 
30,000  rubles  for  the  right  of  copyright  for  a  short  time, 
and  12,000  rubles  for  the  right  merely  of  serial  publica- 
tion in  his  weekly  paper.  Tolstoy,  after  some  hesita- 
tion, accepted  the  smaller  sum.  As  soon  as  the  weekly 
installments  were  printed,  other  publishers  began  to 
reissue  them,  and  Marx  made  complaints  to  Tolstoy. 
Tolstoy  then  wrote  an  open  letter,  praying  publishers 
to  refrain  from  reprinting  any  part  of  the  work  until 
its  completion,  and  so  great  was  his  moral  authority 
in  Russia  that  his  request  was  heeded.  Tolstoy,  in 
revising  the  book,  so  greatly  lengthened  it  that  Marx 
voluntarily  added  an  extra  10,000  rubles  to  his  fee. 
But  the  profit  for  the  Dukhobors,  both  from  the  publi- 
cation in  Russia,  and  from  the  translations,  was  less 


LIFE:    1878-1910  291 

than  if  the  work  had  been  handled  in  the  ordinary  com- 
mercial fashion. 

Once  settled  in  northwest  Canada,  the  Dukhobors  at 
first  through  misunderstandings  caused  trouble  to  the 
Canadian  authorities,  but  with  the  lapse  of  time  nearly  all 
of  them  have  become  industrious  and  inoffensive  colonists. 

The  Dukhobor  leader  Verigin  in  his  letters  had  argued 
against  the  use  of  books  and  railways,  stating  with  truth 
that  for  the  production  of  each  hard  labor  under- 
ground and  at  furnaces  is  needful.  This  was  a  perfectly 
legitimate  corollary  of  doctrine  already  preached  by 
Tolstoy.  But  Tolstoy,  instead  of  approving  his  too  apt 
disciple,  replied  to  him  with  a  characteristic  vein  of 
opposition.  For  once  he  takes  the  sound  position  that 
one  must  try  to  ameliorate  social  conditions  instead 
of  merely  to  cancel  work  already  done  by  man: 

To  tell  you  the  truth,  your  obstinate  attack  on  books  has 
seemed  to  me  a  narrow-minded  sectarian  way  of  defending 
an  opinion  once  accepted  and  expressed.  And  such  narrow- 
mindedness  is  not  in  accord  with  the  opinion  that  I  have 
formed  of  your  intelligence  and  above  all  of  your  frankness  and 
sincerity.  .  .  . 

As  for  your  argument  that  for  books  and  railways  men 
need  to  crawl  underground  for  ore  and  into  a  blast-furnace, 
they  need  to  do  so  just  as  much  for  a  plowshare,  a  spade,  or 
a  scythe.  And  in  crawling  underground  for  ore  or  working 
at  a  blast-furnace  there  is  nothing  bad;  and  I  myself  when  I 
was  young  would  have  gladly  done  so,  and  even  now  any 
fine  young  man  will  gladly  crawl  underground  from  mere  high 
spirits  and  will  work  iron,  provided  only  this  is  not  com- 


m  ^oLstoY 

pulsory  and  does  not  last  all  his  life  and  is  accompanied  by 
all  the  conveniences  that  men  will  surely  invent,  in  case  all 
men  are  to  work  and  not  merely  hired  slaves.  .  . 

When  I  see  an  ant-hill  in  the  meadow  I  can  in  no  way 
admit  that  the  ants  made  a  mistake  in  raising  this  hill  and 
in  doing  all  that  they  are  doing  in  it.  Just  so,  looking  at  all 
that  men  have  done  in  a  material  way,  I  cannot  admit  that  they 
have  done  all  this  by  mistake.  As  a  man  (and  not  an  ant) 
I  see  mistakes  in  the  human  hill  and  cannot  help  wishing 
to  correct  them — that  is  my  part  in  the  general  work — but  I 
do  not  wish  to  destroy  the  whole  hill  of  human  toil,  but  only 
to  arrange  more  regularly  in  it  all  that  has  been  arranged  ir- 
regularly in  it.  And  in  the  human  hill  very  much  has  been 
arranged  irregularly:  of  this  I  have  written  and  still  write; 
because  of  this  I  have  suffered  and  still  suffer;  and  I  am 
trying,  up  to  the  measure  of  my  strength,  to  change  it.  .   .    . 

If  men  only  knew  that  the  aim  of  humanity  is  not  material 
progress,  that  this  progress  is  an  inevitable  growth,  but  that 
the  only  aim  is  the  good  of  all  men,  that  this  aim  is  higher 
than  any  material  aim  that  men  may  set  themselves — then  all 
would  fall  into  its  proper  place.  And  to  this  the  men  of  our 
time  should  direct  all  their  strength.  [Second  Letter:  printed 
in  Letters  of  Verigin  (Christchurch,  1901),  pp.  215-219.] 

Another  and  a  very  important  instance  of  Tolstoy's 
concessions  to  practicality  is  his  enthusiastic  adoption 
and  advocacy  of  Henry  George's  single-tax  program, 
with  its  object  of  freeing  the  land  from  private  owner- 
ship. The  sufferings  of  the  Russian  peasants  for  lack 
of  land  had  weighed  upon  Tolstoy,  and  he  caught  at 
this  solution,  which  seemed  to  him  just  and  practi- 


LIFE:    1878-1910  293 

cable;  he  supports  it,  among  other  places,  in  his  paper 
To  the  Working  People  (1902).  He  wrote  to  his  wife 
in  1897  that  the  death  of  Henry  George  affected  him 
as  that  of  a  very  near  friend.*  In  conversation  he 
hkened  the  single-tax  question  in  contemporary  society 
to  that  of  the  emancipation  of  the  serfs  in  the  days  of 
his  own  youth.  The  single-tax  system  of  course  implies 
a  strong  government  to  collect  the  tax,  and  thus  con- 
tradicts Tolstoy's  ideal.  His  reply  was,  that  so  long 
as  government  existed,  men  should  try  to  secure  good 
laws,  and  that  the  single  tax  would  be  one  of  the  best 
possible.!  Thus  Tolstoy  has  adopted  a  practical  point 
of  view  such  as  one  might  expect  from  a  Liberal  or  a 
Socialist.  But  do  not  be  too  sure  of  his  conversion;  the 
spirit  of  the  loyal  Russian  noble  was  still  alive  in  him. 
"I  think,"  he  told  a  visitor  in  1894,  "that  such  a  change 
[as  the  single-tax  system]  may  be  carried  out  by  the 
absolute  authority.  As  the  freeing  of  the  peasants  was 
realized  by  the  will  of  the  tsar,  so  the  abolition  of  land 
injustice  may  be  realized  by  a  similar  authority.  No 
other  authority  will  do  it,  because  it  will  contradict  the 
interests  of  the  classes  who  support  that  authority."t 

To  the  last  Tolstoy  never  fully  overcame  his  disHke 
for  the  Liberals  and  the  Socialists,  against  whom  on 
occasion  he  would  fulmine  out  his  scorn.  And  yet,  now 
that  he  himself  was  a  prominent  figure  in  the  political 


*  Letters  to  Wife,  p.  532. 

t  Maude:  XL  629. 

X  Semenov,  in  Messenger  of  Europe,  Sept.,  1908,  p.  37. 


294  TOLSTOY 

world,  if  only  as  a  denier  of  politics,  and  now  that  his 
acquaintance  with  men  of  all  stripes  of  opinion  was 
broader  than  in  his  younger  days,  he  at  times  uttered 
views  that  were  quite  at  variance  with  his  fundamental 
no-government  attitude.  He  was  stirred  to  indignation 
in  1895,  when  the  young  tsar,  Nicholas  II,  in  reply  to 
a  loyal  petition  of  the  Tver  provincial  council,  praying 
that  the  people  might  be  given  a  voice  in  the  govern- 
ment of  the  country,  denounced  their  requests  as  "in- 
sensate dreams."*  He  refers  to  this  incident  in  a  letter 
to  the  tsar,  written  in  1902,  in  which  he  denounces 
autocracy  as  "an  outlived  form  of  government,  that 
may  answer  to  the  demands  of  a  people  somewhere  in 
central  Africa,  distant  from  the  whole  world,  but  not 
to  the  demands  of  the  Russian  people,  which  is  becoming 
more  and  more  enlightened  with  the  enlightenment 
common  to  the  whole  world."  Of  the  SociaHsts  and 
Revolutionists  he  gives  a  not  unkindly  picture  in  Resur- 
rection. While  he  denounces  their  methods,  he  is  stirred 
by  their  heroism  and  finds  among  them  admirable  types 
of  character.  The  moral  nature  of  his  heroine  Katyusha 
is  aroused  by  their  unselfish  enthusiasm. 

It  is  striking  that  while  Tolstoy's  writings  were 
prohibited  in  Russia,  and  his  followers  often  severely 
persecuted,  he  himself  was  left  in  peace.  Alone  and 
unaided,  he  was  a  man  whom  the  government  feared 
to  touch.  He  was  acknowledged  as  beyond  comparison 
the  chief  man  of  letters  in  Russia,  and  as  a  good  man, 
♦Maude:  II,  500, 


LIFE:    1878-1910  295 

the  glory  of  the  nation.  He  had  repeatedly  denounced 
acts  of  violence  committed  against  the  government  with 
the  same  indignation  that  he  had  shown  towards  those 
perpetrated  by  the  government.  Force  used  against  a 
man  whose  creed  was  simple  goodness  would  have 
raised  a  tempest  of  indignation  all  through  the  empire. 
Tolstoy's  personality  was  stronger  than  the  state. 

At  one  time  an  attempt  was  made  to  have  Tolstoy 
confined  in  a  monastery  as  a  heretic.  This  is  said  to 
have  been  thwarted  by  the  tsar  Alexander  III  him- 
self, who  is  reported  to  have  said  to  the  minister  of  the 
interior:  "I  beg  you  not  to  touch  Lev  Tolstoy;  I  have 
no  intention  of  making  a  martyr  of  him  and  drawing  on 
myself  the  dislike  of  all  Russia.  If  he  is  to  blame,  so 
much  the  worse  for  him."* 

The  Russian  Church,  however,  did  not  allow  Tolstoy's 
attacks  on  it  to  pass  without  notice.  On  March  10, 
1901,  the  Holy  Synod,  its  governing  body,  pubhshed  an 
official  notice  stating  that  Tolstoy  "with  the  zeal  of  a 
fanatic"  preached  "the  overthrow  of  all  the  dogmas 
of  the  Orthodox  Church  and  of  the  very  essence  of  the 
Christian  faith,"  and  that  "therefore  the  church  does 
not  regard  him  as  a  member  and  cannot  so  regard  him 
until  he  repents  and  renews  his  communion  with  it." 
This  was  generally  regarded  as  a  decree  of  excommunica- 
tion.   The  effect  of  the  document  was  to  increase  the 


*  The  statement  rests  on  the  authority  of  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy 
(Correspondence  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  p.  60).  There  are 
difficulties  in  accepting  it;  see  Maude:  II,  448. 


29G  TOLSTOY 

dislike  and  contempt  for  the  church  authorities  felt  by 
thinking  Russians,  and  to  deepen  their  reverence  for 
Tolstoy;  on  the  other  hand  it  was  the  cause  of  con- 
siderable annoyance  to  him  through  the  feeling  that 
it  stirred  up  among  the  less  intelligent  part  of  the  popula- 
tion. It  roused  him  to  a  burst  of  noble  eloquence  in 
defence  of  his  own  position.  His  summary  of  his  own 
creed,  with  which  he  closes  his  reply,  demands  quota- 
tion: 

Here  is  what  is  just  and  what  is  unjust  in  the  Synod's  de- 
cree in  regard  to  me.  I  really  do  not  believe  in  what  they  say 
that  they  believe  in.  But  I  believe  in  much  in  which  they  wish 
to  convince  people  that  I  do  not  believe. 

I  believe  in  the  following:  I  believe  in  God,  whom  I  under- 
stand as  Spirit,  as  Love,  as  the  Beginning  of  All.  I  believe  that 
He  is  in  me  and  I  in  Him.  I  believe  that  the  will  of  God  is  most 
clearly,  most  comprehensibly  expressed  in  the  teaching  of  the 
man  Christ,  to  understand  whom  as  God  and  to  pray  to  whom 
I  regard  as  the  greatest  blasphemy.  I  believe  that  the  true 
good  of  man  is  in  the  fulfilling  of  the  will  of  God,  and  that  His 
will  consists  in  that  men  should  love  one  another  and  in  con- 
sequence of  this  do  unto  others  as  they  would  have  others  do 
unto  them,  as  it  is  said  in  the  Gospel  that  in  this  is  all  the 
law  and  the  prophets.  I  beheve  that  the  sense  of  life  of  every 
man  is  therefore  only  in  the  increasing  of  love  within  him- 
self; that  this  increasing  of  love^  leads  an  individual  man  in 
this  life  to  continually  greater  and  greater  good;  and  after 
death  gives  him  greater  good  in  proportion  as  love  is  greater 
within  him;  and  at  the  same  time  contributes  more  than 
aught  else  to  estabhshing  in  this  world  the  Kingdom  of  God, 


LIFE:    1878-1910  m 

that  is,  an  order  of  life  in  which  the  discord,  deceit,  and  violence 
at  present  reigning  shall  be  replaced  by  free  concord,  truth, 
and  brotherly  love  of  men  one  to  another.  I  believe  that  for 
progress  in  love  there  is  only  one  means,  prayer — ^not  public 
prayer  in  temples,  which  is  directly  prohibited  by  Christ 
(Matt,  vi,  5—13) — but  prayer  the  model  of  which  was  given  us 
by  Christ,  solitary  prayer,  consisting  in  the  establishing 
and  fixing  in  our  own  consciousness  of  the  sense  of  our  own 
life  and  of  our  dependence  only  on  the  will  of  God. 

Whether  or  not  these  beliefs  of  mine  offend,  grieve,  or  se- 
duce any  man,  hinder  anything  or  anybody  or  are  displeasing 
to  him — I  can  change  them  just  as  little  as  my  own  body. 
I  must  live  alone  and  die  alone  (and  very  soon),  and  therefore  I 
cannot  believe  otherwise  than  I  do  believe,  preparing  to  go  to 
that  God  from  whom  I  came.  I  do  not  believe  that  my  faith 
is  indubitably  the  one  truth  for  all  time,  but  I  see  none  other 
that  is  simpler,  clearer,  and  more  correspondent  to  all  the 
demands  of  my  mind  and  heart;  if  I  learn  of  such  a  faith,  I 
shall  at  once  accept  it,  because  God  needs  naught  but  the 
truth.  But  I  can  in  no  way  return  to  that  from  which  I  have 
just  come  forth  with  such  sufferings,  as  a  flying  bird  cannot 
return  to  the  eggshell  from  which  it  has  come  forth. 

"He  who  begins  by  loving  Christianity  better  than  Truth 
will  proceed  by  loving  his  own  Sect  or  Church  better  than 
Christianity,  and  end  in  loving  himself  [his  own  repose]  better 
than  all,"  said  Coleridge. 

I  have  proceeded  by  the  opposite  path.  I  began  by  loving 
my  orthodox  faith  more  than  my  repose,  then  I  came  to  love 
Christianity  more  than  my  Church,  and  now  I  love  Truth  more 
than  all  else  in  the  world.  And  for  me  Truth  still  coincides 
with  Christianity,  as  I  understand  it.  And  I  profess  this 
Christianity,  and  in  the  measure  in  which  I  profess  it  I  live 


^98  TOLSTOY 

calmly  and  joyously,  and  calmly  and  joyously  I  approach 
death. 

Tolstoy  was  busy  with  writing  on  religious  and  social 
questions  almost  to  the  day  of  his  death.  His  longest 
and  most  important  work  of  this  sort  after  What  Shall 
We  Do  Then?  is  The  Kingdom  of  God  is  Within  YoUy 
which  was  composed  in  1892-93,  while  he  was  busy  with 
the  relief  of  the  starving  peasants.  In  form  this  book  is  a 
defence  of  My  Religion  against  attacks  that  had  been 
made  on  it;  in  substance  it  is  mainly  an  eloquent 
denunciation  of  war.  In  My  Religion  Tolstoy  had 
treated  of  the  personal  life,  in  What  Shall  We  Do  Then? 
of  the  life  of  the  community;  he  now  broadened  his 
field  to  include  international  relations.  The  propaganda 
of  this  work  is  the  part  of  Tolstoy's  teaching  that  has 
rightly  won  most  admiration  and  least  ridicule  through- 
out the  world.  Tolstoy  became  famous — and  influential 
— as  the  greatest  living  apostle  of  international  peace. 
His  remedy,  to  be  sure,  was  not  that  of  other  peace 
advocates.  They  would  end  war  by  international  agree- 
ments, scraps  of  paper  that  in  the  past  nations  have 
repeatedly  violated  for  the  sake  of  temporary  ad- 
vantage. Tolstoy  would  obtain  peace  by  a  transfor- 
mation of  the  conscience  of  humanity,  so  that  no  man 
would  consent  to  serve  in  an  army,  whether  in  war  or  in 
peace.  Here,  as  always,  Tolstoy  is  more  powerful  in 
denouncing  ills  than  in  showing  the  way  out  from  them. 
But  this  time  the  ills  are  those  felt  by  all  humanity,  so 


LIFE:    1878-1910  29Q 

that  Tolstoy's  voice  was  the  clearest  and  most  penetrat- 
ing among  those  of  a  band  of  reformers  rather  than  a 
cry  from  the  wilderness.  Despite  the  desolation  that  is 
now  sweeping  over  Europe,  he  has  been  an  influence  of 
real  power,  a  prophet  of  a  better  time  to  come. 

Tolstoy  resumed  the  same  theme  in  numerous  short 
pamphlets,  such  as  Christianity  and  Patriotism  (1894), 
Patriotism  or  Peace  (1896),  Patriotism  and  Govern- 
ment (1900),  and  Bethink  Yourselves!  (1904),  the  last  of 
which  was  occasioned  by  the  war  between  Russia  and 
Japan.  Here  he  denounced  patriotism  as  "a  crude, 
harmful,  disgraceful,  and  bad,  and  above  all,  an  immoral 
feeling."*  Tolstoy's  ideal  was  that  of  the  saint.  Pa- 
triotism, though  it  is  a  modified  form  of  selfishness,  is 
at  least  higher  than  the  personal  selfishness,  the  love  of 
ease  and  quiet  and  the  forgetfulness  of  all  ideals,  which  is 
at  present  opposed  to  it  more  often  than  the  saintliness 
of  Tolstoy.  The  aim  may  sometimes  justify  the  means, 
as  Tolstoy  often  showed  in  his  own  practice.  War  for 
a  high  ideal,  in  the  name  of  freedom  and  of  peace,  is  a 
lesser  evil  than  supine  submission  to  the  wrong  done  in 
the  world.  Pathetically  enough,  Tolstoy  found  that 
the  spirit  of  the  artillery  officer  was  not  dead  within  him; 
he  "nearly  wept  at  the  news  of  the  fall  of  Port  Arthur. "f 

In  general,  Tolstoy's  latest  religious  writings  consist 

of  a  multitude  of  essays,  letters,  and  notes,  which  of 

course  cannot  be  considered  separately.    Some  of  their 

departures  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  works  imme- 

*  Patriotism  and  Government,  ch.  7,  t  Maude:  II,  618. 


SOO  TOLSTOY 

diately  following  his  conversion  have  already  been  men- 
tioned. His  emphasis  on  non-resistance  becomes  more 
extreme  than  ever.  In  My  Religion  he  had  countenanced 
force  used  towards  a  child  for  a  good  aim;*  now,  in 
his  letter  to  Rakhmanov  (1891)  he  disapproves  even  of 
resistance  to  an  animal,  f  He  told  Anuchin  that  one 
must  not  even  kill  a  wolf  that  attacks  him;  "for  if  we 
may  kill  a  wolf,  we  may  also  kill  a  dog,  and  a  man,  and 
there  will  be  no  limit  !"t 

In  his  latest  years  Tolstoy  made  a  collection  of  pas- 
sages from  great  thinkers,  from  Lao-tsze  and  Plato  to 
Emerson  and  Henry  George,  interspersed  with  passages 
of  his  own  writing,  arranged  as  a  Course  of  Reading  for 
every  day  in  the  year.  To  this  he  attached  great  im- 
portance. "I  should  like  to  have  my  readers  experience 
in  the  daily  reading  of  this  book,"  he  writes  in  his  pref- 
ace, "the  same  beneficent,  elevating  feeling  which  I 
have  experienced  in  its  compilation  and  now  continue 
to  experience  in  its  perusal." 

What  impresses  one  in  Tolstoy's  old  age  is  his  constant 
mental  and  spiritual  activity,  his  ever-youthful  search 
for  new  truth,  even  if  that  truth,  when  found,  be  but 
the  old  expressed  in  different  words.  He  fulfills  the 
prophecy  that  he  had  written  in  Youth:  "I  am  con- 
vinced that  if  I  am  fated  to  live  to  extreme  old  age, 
and  my  tale  overtakes  my  years,  as  an  old  man  of 

*  See  p.  239,  above. 

t  Letters,  collected  hy  SergSyenJco  (Moscow,  1910):   I,  200. 

t  Maude:  II,  474. 


LIFE:    1878-1910  301 

seventy  I  shall  indulge  in  the  same  impossible,  childish 
dreams  as  now."*  In  Tolstoy  there  was  no  calm, 
whether  of  intellectual,  self-confident  repose,  or  of 
spiritual  saintliness.  "It  is  evil,"  he  writes  in  a  private 
letter,  "when  a  man  says  to  himself:  *I  have  become 
better  than  I  was;  thus  I  do  not  smoke,  I  do  not  commit 
adultery,  I  give  away  the  tenth  part  of  my  property, 
and  do  not  act  as  the  publicans  do.'  God  grant  that  you 
may  always  be  dissatisfied  and  not  see  the  road  that  you 
have  traversed  in  drawing  near  Him!"t  "The  dis- 
agreement of  life  with  what  it  should  be,  or,  more 
exactly  speaking,  with  what  it  will  be,  is  just  its  charac- 
teristic mark,  the  sign  of  life.  ...  In  every  man  a 
movement  takes  place  from  an  inferior  state  to  a  su- 
perior state,  from  the  worse  to  the  better,  from  the 
smaller  to  the  larger:  all  this  may  be  called  life."t 

Yet  this  account  of  Tolstoy's  last  years  may  best  close 
with  a  picture  of  him  as  a  quiet,  practical  counsellor.  In 
a  letter  to  his  wife,  written  in  1894,  he  tells  of  an  interview 
with  an  eccentric  vagrant  who  came  to  him  for  counsel: 

I  tried  in  every  way  to  persuade  him  to  settle  with  his 
father,  and  there,  resting  from  the  ascetic  life  that  he  is  lead- 
ing— he  wears  bast  shoes  and  is  covered  with  lice — to  choose 
some  work  for  himself,  and  above  all  to  make  people  love  him, 
instead  of  being  afraid  of  him,  as  they  are  now;  to  try  to  be 
useful  and  pleasant  to  men. — [Letters  to  Wife,  p.  482.1 

*  See  page  33,  above. 

t  Correspondance  inedite  (Paris,  1907),  pp.  351,  352. 

X  Ibid.,  p.  349. 


CHAPTER  IX 

LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;   "wHAT   IS   ART?" 

OLSTOY'S  continued  growth  in  a  religious 
view  of  life  had  the  effect  of  deepening  his 
kindly  feelings  toward  Turgenev.  In  1881  he 
twice  visited  Turgenev  on  his  estate.  Upon 
the  poet  Polonsky,  who  was  also  visiting  Turgenev  at 
the  time,  he  made  the  impression  of  a  changed  man, 
"as  it  were  reborn,  penetrated  with  another  faith,  an- 
other love."  "On  neither  of  us  did  he  force  his  way  of 
thinking,  and  he  listened  calmly  to  the  objections  of 
Turgenev.  In  a  word,  this  was  no  longer  the  Count  whom 
I  had  once  known  in  his  youth."* 

In  1882  Turgenev  wrote  to  a  friend  his  impression  of 
Tolstoy's  Confession: 

I  recently  received  through  a  very  charming  Moscow 
lady  Tolstoy's  Confession^  which  the  censorship  has  prohibited. 
I  have  read  it  with  great  interest;  it  is  remarkable  for  its 
sincerity,  truthfulness,  and  force  of  conviction.  But  it  is 
all  built  on  false  premises  and  finally  leads  to  the  most  gloomy 
negation  of  all  human  life.  .  .  .  This  is  a  nihilism  of  its  own 
sort.    I  wonder  why  Tolstoy,  who  among  other  things  denies 

♦Biryukov:  11,393,394. 
302 


^^MM 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;  *'WHAT  IS  ART?"  303 

even  art,  surrounds  himself  with  artists,  and  what  they  can 
derive  from  his  conversation.  And  yet  Tolstoy  is  almost  the 
most  remarkable  man  of  contemporary  Russia. — [Biryukov: 
II,  435.] 

Turgenev  had  been  a  constant  admirer  of  Tolstoy's 
artistic  genius  and  had  never  ceased  to  lament  his 
friend's  neglect  of  it.  In  1879  he  had  written  to  Polon- 
sky:  "L.  Tolstoy,  as  a  great  and  living  talent,  will  leap 
out  of  the  mire  in  which  he  is  stuck,  and  with  benefit  to 
literature."  In  1883  he  addressed  to  Tolstoy  himself, 
from  his  death-bed,  the  following  touching  appeal: 

Dear  and  beloved  Lev  Nikolayevich! 

I  have  not  written  to  you  for  a  long  time,  for  I  have  been 
ill,  and  am,  to  speak  frankly,  on  my  death-bed.  I  cannot 
recover,  and  there  is  no  use  thinking  of  it.  I  am  writing  to 
you  just  to  tell  you  how  glad  I  have  been  to  be  your  con- 
temporary, and  to  express  to  you  my  last  request.  My  friend, 
return  to  your  literary  work.  That  gift  of  yours  comes  from 
the  same  source  as  all  else.  Ah,  how  happy  I  should  be  if  I 
could  think  that  my  request  would  have  an  effect  upon  you ! .  .  . 
I  am  a  doomed  man;  the  doctors  do  not  even  know  what  to 
call  my  complaint,  nevralgie  stomocale  gouteuse.  I  can  neither 
walk,  nor  eat,  nor  sleep !  It  is  tiresome  even  to  mention  all  this. 
My  friend,  great  writer  of  the  Russian  land,  heed  my  request. 
Let  me  know  whether  you  receive  this  paper,  and  permit  me 
once  more  to  embrace  closely,  closely  yourself,  your  wife,  and  all 
yours.    I  can  no  more.    I  am  weary. — [Biryukov:  II,  451, 452.] 

This  appeal  liad  no  direct  effect  on  Tolstoy,  who 
worked  according  to  his  own  bent,  quite  independently 


304  TOLSTOY 

of  any  urging  from  others.  In  1884  he  wrote  to  his 
wife,  presumably  in  reference  to  one  of  his  reHgious 
works:  "I  must  write,  I  absolutely  must,  but  I  have 
not  that  passionate  longing  without  which  it  is  im- 
possible."* As  a  matter  of  fact  he  disliked  the  title 
"great  writer  of  the  Russian  land,"  which  Turgenev 
had  bestowed  on  him,  and  which  clung  to  him  ever 
afterwards.!  But  after  Turgenev's  death,  despite  his 
dislike  for  public  speaking,  he  eagerly  accepted  an  in- 
vitation from  the  Society  of  Lovers  of  Russian  Litera- 
ture in  Moscow  to  give  an  address  at  a  projected  cele- 
bration in  Turgenev's  honor,  and  he  applied  himself 
with  enthusiasm  to  the  reading  of  his  works.  He  was 
particularly  charmed  by  Enoughy  of  which  he  had 
written  most  contemptuously  in  1865. t  Unfortunately 
the  Russian  authorities  forbade  the  projected  public 
celebration;  and,  as  Tolstoy  would  not  write  out  his 
speech  for  publication,  Russian  literature  was  deprived 
of  what  would  have  been  a  most  striking  verdict  on 
Turgenev's  life  and  work. 

For  eight  years  after  the  completion  of  Anna  Karenin 
Tolstoy  entirely  laid  aside  realistic  fiction,  the  type  of 
work  in  which  he  was  supreme.  During  this  interval 
the  only  works  of  the  imagination  that  he  produced 
were  a  few  short  stories,  often  containing  supernatural 
elements,  and  some  of  them  founded  on  popular  legends. 


*  Letters  to  Wife,  p.  229. 

t  Count  Ilya  Tolstoy:    Reminiscences  of  Tolstoy,  p.  230. 

X  Letters  to  Wife,  p.  202;  and  Biryukov:  II,  66. 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;  "WHAT  IS  ART?'*  305 

of  which  What  Men  Live  By  (1881)  is  perhaps  the  best. 
This  and  succeeding  tales  of  the  same  sort  are  not 
without  power,  but  taken  by  themselves  they  would  give 
no  hint  of  Tolstoy's  real  genius.  His  religious  and 
sociological  writings.  My  Religion  and  What  Shall  We 
Do  Then  F,  make  their  appeal,  as  has  already  been  pointed 
out,  by  the  illustrations  drawn  from  daily  life,  by  the 
same  intimacy  with  the  readers'  daily  lives  that  dis- 
tinguishes War  and  Peace.  These  short  tales  have  the 
same  patent  didactic  purpose  as  the  religious  writings 
with  which  they  are  contemporary,  but  unfortunately 
they  seem  deprived  of  the  truth  of  observation  that  is 
Tolstoy's  distinguishing  trait.  In  an  article.  On  the 
Truth  in  Art  (1887),  Tolstoy  strove  to  justify  his  methods 
in  them  by  saying  that  the  fundamental  truth  of  moral 
ideas  is  the  only  thing  that  matters  in  art.  Yet  in 
What  is  Art?  (1898)  he  characteristically  did  not  class 
these  stories  as  good  art,  but  preferred  to  them  God  Sees 
the  Truth  and  The  Prisoner  of  the  Caucasus  (cf.  p.  344), 
in  which  the  supernatural  machinery  is  absent  and  a 
plain,  direct  narrative  enforces  its  own  lesson.  Tol- 
stoy's genius,  wonderful  in  its  picturing  of  every-day 
reahty,  was  not  adapted  to  symbolism;  he  reached  suc- 
cess in  but  few  cases,  among  which  one  may  mention 
particularly  his  late  tale  Esarhaddon  (1903). 

But  Tolstoy's  genius  could  not  permanently  be  di- 
verted from  its  native  bent.  In  1886  he  suddenly  pro- 
duced The  Death  of  Ivan  Ilyich  (a  story),  and  The  Power 
of  Darkness   (a   drama);    three  years  later  he   wrote 


306  TOLSTOY 

The  Kreutzer  Sonata  (a  short  novel)  and  The  Fruits  of 
Enlightenment  (a  comedy) ;  in  1895  there  followed  a  short 
story,  blaster  and  Man;  then,  in  1899,  he  completed, 
under  circumstances  that  have  been  already  described, 
a  long  novel,  Resurrection,  of  which  he  had  received  the 
subject  in  1888  from  his  friend  Senator  Koni.  To 
these  we  may  add  The  Devil  (1889),  Father  Sergy  (1890- 
98),  The  Living  Corpse  (1900),  Hadji  Murad  (1896-1904), 
and  a  few  other  works  which  were  left  unfinished  or  with- 
out final  revision,  and  which  were  not  published  until 
after  his  death.  These  writings  show  the  novelist's 
genius  undimmed  by  the  lapse  of  years. 

Undimmed,  but  not  unchanged.  Through  this  series  of 
works  there  runs  a  somber,  intense  moral  purpose 
that  continually  transforms  them  into  Puritan  tracts. 

Not  even  the  earliest  of  Tolstoy's  works  can  be  called 
gay.  The  author  of  Childhood  was  so  wide  awake  to 
the  seamy  side  of  human  character  that  his  picture  of 
the  world  at  times  appears  pessimistic.  In  War  and 
Peace,  despite  the  fullness  of  happy  life  that  pervades 
the  book,  there  is  a  strain  of  intensity;  life  is  serious 
and  grim  despite  its  joyous  aspects.  Now,  in  these 
works  written  after  his  religious  conversion  (if  we  except 
The  Fruits  of  Enlightenment  and  Hadji  Murad)  the 
note  of  joy,  of  eager  delight  in  the  life  of  the  flesh,  has 
disappeared.  No  gracious,  maidenly  figures  like  Natasha 
dance  through  these  later  works;  murder,  moral  torture, 
lust,  adultery,  lie  at  their 'foundation.  The  life  of  the 
«   body  is  shown  to  be  wholly  bad,  while  to  it  Tolstoy 


LATEK  ARTISTIC  WORKS;  "WHAT  IS  ART?"  307 

contrasts  a  spiritual  bliss,  a  moral  awakening,  to  which  ^ 
he  vainly  strives  to  give  convincing  human  form. 

The  mildest  of  the  somber  series  is  the  first,  The  Death 
of  Ivan  Ilyich,  A  lawyer  of  fair  talents,  a  Philistine 
worldling,  an  average  man,  neither  bad  nor  good, 
neither  rich  nor  poor,  injures  himself  internally  by  a 
fall  from  a  step-ladder.  The  injury,  which  at  first 
caused  only  slight  discomfort,  becomes  more  and  more 
painful;  Ivan  Ilyich  sees  before  him  a  slow,  agonizing 
death,  jln  his  wife  and  children  he  finds  no  true  sym- 
pathy; to  them  his  helpless  suffering  is  nothing  but  a 
nuisanceJ  Only  his  peasant  man-servant,  healthy  and 
with  an  uncorrupted  natural  unselfishness,  treats  him 
with  genuine  kindness.  At  last  Ivan  Ilyich  perceives  that 
his  years  on  earth  have  been  wasted  in  ignorance  of 
life's  true  meaning.  He  dies  after  three  days  that  have 
been  one  yell  of  pain,  from  which  his  family  have  shel- 
tered themselves  behind  closed  doorsy  f  His  wife  is 
mainly  concerned  about  receiving  J^eWpensioiS  his 
colleagues,  about  the  appointiirefit  of  a  successor;  "^ 

This  tale,  of  some  eighty  pages,  is  distinguished 
from  Tolstoy's  earlier  writings  by  its  unity,  ks  con- 
centration on  one  central  theme.  Tolstoy  no  longer 
strives  to  give  the  full,  rounded  presentation  of  life  that 
he  had  achieved  in  Anna  Karenin.  Hence  comes  the 
overpowering  intensity  of  the  work.  Holland  tells  of 
finding  enthusiasm  for  it  among  the  French  bourgeoisie, 
a  class  naturally  impervious  to  art  and  literature. 
Amid  its  darkness  there  is  a  ray  of  hope;    the  new 


508  TOLSTOY 

consciousness  of  life,  of  the  unborn,  untemporal  life, 
awakens  in  Ivan  Ilyich  just  before  his  death.  From  the 
stark,  grim  reality  that  confronts  the  reader  at  every 
turn  the  only  escape  is  in  the  spiritual  life. 
►  In  Master  and  Man  Tolstoy  resumed  the  same  theme, 
the  kindling  in  a  callous  soul  of  a  spark  of  spiritual 
truth.  The  setting  is  the  same  as  in  the  youthful  Snow- 
storm (1856),  but  what  a  difference  in  tone!  A  coarse, 
skinflint  merchant,  driving  with  his  peasant  workman, 
is  overtaken  by  a  snowstorm.  He  sees  the  peasant 
freezing  to  death,  throws  himself  upon  him,  and  warms 
him  with  the  heat  of  his  own  body.  Himself  dying,  he 
feels  the  bliss  of  self-sacrifice.  The  peasant  survives 
while  the  merchant  perishes. 

The  same  theme  of  conversion  occurs  in  The  Power 
of  Darkness,  a  ghastly  drama  of  peasant  life,  founded  on 
an  incident  that  had  actually  come  before  a  court  in 
Tula.  As  a  mere  literary  achievement,  it  is  remarkable 
that  Tolstoy  at  the  age  of  fifty-eight  should  have  been 
able  to  take  up  the  dramatic  form.  In  1863,  to  be  sure, 
he  had  written  two  comedies,  neither  of  which  has 
been  published,  and  in  1870  he  had  a  period  of  intense 
enthusiasm  for  the  drama,  reading  eagerly  Shakespeare, 
Moli^re,  and  Goethe.  Nevertheless  the  dramatic  form 
was  essentially  new  to  him.  His  novels  are  as  little 
dramatic  as  any  ever  written;  the  attempts  to  recast 
Anna  Karenin  and  Resurrection  as  acting  plays  have 
resulted  in  dismal  parodies.  Conversation  in  his  stories 
is    relatively    insignificant    and    commonplace,    while 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;  "WHAT  IS  ART?"  309 

very  much  depends  on  the  description  of  accessories, 
manner,  and  gesture,  and  on  the  analysis  of  the  char- 
acters* thoughts.  Tolstoy  himself  likened  the  difference 
between  a  novel  and  a  drama  to  that  between  paint- 
ing and  sculpture.  He  told  Feinermann  of  his  diflS- 
culties: 

The  whole  difference  between  the  novel  and  the  drama  I 
came  to  understand  when  I  set  to  work  on  my  Power  of  Dark- 
ness. At  first  I  attacked  it  with  those  novelist's  methods  to 
which  I  was  more  accustomed.  But  after  the  first  pages  I 
saw  that  here  matters  were  different.  Here  it  was  impossible, 
for  example,  to  prepare  the  crises  of  the  heroes'  experiences, 
impossible  to  make  them  think  on  the  stage  and  remember 
things,  to  light  up  their  characters  by  digressions  into  the 
past — all  this  is  tiresome,  wearisome,  and  unnatural.  One 
needs  crises  already  prepared.  Before  the  public  there  must 
be  states  of  the  soul  already  formed,  decisions  that  have  been 
adopted.  Only  such  reliefs  of  the  soul,  such  chiseled  forms 
in  mutual  collisions  agitate  and  touch  the  spectator. 

But  monologues  and  various  transitions  with  tableaux  and 
tones  of  voice — all  such  things  disgust  the  spectator,  who  begins 
to  regret  that  the  chairs  were  not  set  with  their  backs  to  the 
stage.  To  be  sure,  I  did  not  restrain  myself,  and  I  inserted 
several  monologues  in  The  Power  of  Darkness,  but,  while  in- 
serting them,  I  felt  that  I  was  not  acting  properly.  It  is  hard 
for  an  old  novelist  to  refrain  from  that,  as  it  is  hard  for  a  coach- 
man to  hold  in  his  horses,  when  a  heavy  coach  is  pressing  down 
on  them  from  a  slope. — [Teneromo:  Life  and  Conversations 
of  L.  N.  Tolstoy,  p.  40.*1 

*  In  general,  information  furnished  by  Feinermann  must  be  received 
with  caution,  but  this  account  smacks  of  the  truth. 


310  TOLSTOY 

That  Tolstoy  could  overcome  these  difficulties, 
change  his  whole  technique,  concentrate  his  action 
and  make  the  conversation  tell  the  story,  and,  finally, 
that  he  could  produce  a  drama  that  is  not  only  the  most 
powerful  in  all  Russian  literature,  but  one  which  has  been 
recognized  as  among  the  masterpieces  of  the  modern 
realistic  drama,  influencing  for  example  the  develop- 
ment of  the  drama  in  Germany,  is  a  new  proof  of  his 
many-sided  literary  genius. 

It  is  strange  also  that  this  grewsome  play  should 
be  based  on  the  life  of  the  peasantry,  the  class  from 
which  Tolstoy  drew  his  religious  inspiration.  The 
drama  proves  that  Tolstoy  had  his  eyes  open  to  peasant 
conditions,  seeing  about  him  no  sentimental  "sweet 
Auburn."  The  sturdy  industry  and  faith  of  certain 
peasant  types  had  aided  in  his  own  conversion,  but  he 
had  made  no  false  artistic  generalization  from  them. 

In  a  peasant  family  a  wife  deserts  her  sic^ily  husband 
and  sins  with  a  lusty  young  laborer,  Nikita.  Her  con- 
federate and  helper  is  Nikita's  mother,  Nikita  also 
intrigues  with  the  woman's  half-witted  daughter,  who 
bears  a  child.  This  child  Nikita  and  the  wife  murder. 
The  play  ends  with  Nikita's  confession  of  his  sins; 
remorse  of  conscience  has  overwhelmed  him.  The 
influence  towards  righteousness  in  the  play  is  Nikita's 
father,  the  old  cesspool-cleaner  Akim,  the  man  of  God. 
The  play  is  a  tragedy  of  darkness  and  degradation,  a 
repulsive  picture  of  village  wickedness  beside  which 
The  Widow  in  the  Bye  Street  seems  pale.    The  conversion 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;  "WHAT  IS  ART?'*  311 

in  it  is  not  a  tour  de  force y  brought  in  to  teach  a  moral 
lesson;  it  follows  naturally  from  what  we  have  learned 
of  Nikita's  character.  Tolstoy  followed  the  advice 
that  he  himself  gave  to  Feinermann:  "Do  not  crush 
or  bend  to  suit  your  own  purposes  the  events  of  a  tale, 
but  follow  it  wherever  it  leads  you."* 

In  this  play  the  evil  influences  all  come  from  women. 
One  must  admit  that  in  his  later  works  Tolstoy  con- 
stantly expresses  an  unfavorable  view  of  feminine 
character.  Woman  lacks  the  idealism  of  man;  she  can 
form  no  new  philosophy  of  life,  nor  understand  one  when 
it  is  presented  to  her.  (Tolstoy,  despite  his  love  and 
devotion  for  his  wife,  was  doubtless  affected  by  her 
failure  to  adopt  his  religious  views.)  Tolstoy's  condem- 
nation of  women  flows  from  the  ascetic  side  of  his  ethical 
system,  which  constantly  becomes  more  prominent. 
This  aspect  of  his  teaching  reaches  its  utmost  develop- 
ment in  The  Kreutzer  Sonata  (1889). 

Tolstoy's  greatest  novels  had  been  panegyrics  upon 
family  life.  At  the  close  of  What  Shall  We  Do  Then? 
(1886)  he  had  devoted  to  motherhood  some  of  his  most 
eloquent  pages.  Now,  in  The  Kreutzer  Sonata,  written 
only  three  years  later,  he  definitely  reverses  himself 
and  adopts  a  position  like  that  of  St.  Paul  (in  I  Corin- 
thians, vii,  1-11).  Absolute  celibacy  is  the  ideal  for 
every  virtuous  man,  while  promiscuity  is  the  sin  that 
must  be  shunned  most  of  all.     Marriage  is  a  half-way 

*  Letter  of  December,  1886;  in  letters,  collected  by  SergSyenfio 
(Moscow,  1910):  I,  153. 


512  TOLSTOY 

station,  a  compromise,  not  absolutely  sinful,  but  full  of 
danger  and  without  inspiration.  Such  is  the  philos- 
ophy that  underlies  his  new  picture  of  family  rela- 
tions. 

In  a  railway  train  a  murderer,  Pozdnyshev,  pours 
out  to  a  chance  acquaintance  the  story  of  his  life.  In 
his  youth  he  had  acted  like  most  young  men,  consorting 
freely  with  harlots  and  regarding  the  indulgence  of  his 
sexual  desires  in  the  same  light  as  drinking  or  smoking. 
Then  he  had  married.  His  life  with  his  wife  was  based 
on  sexual  desire,  not  on  any  unselfish  love,  but  still  he 
counted  himself  a  moral  man  because  he  was  not  out- 
wardly unfaithful  to  her.  Quarrels  were  continual; 
there  was  no  mutual  esteem.  They  had  children,  who, 
however,  meant  little  to  them.  The  wife,  who  was 
the  feminine  counterpart  of  her  husband,  found  the  care 
of  children  irksome,  and  with  a  doctor's  aid  took  means 
to  avoid  having  more.  When  she  was  freed  from  child- 
bearing  and  nursing,  her  sexual  impulses  remained  the 
same,  while  her  attractiveness  increased.  Other  men 
paid  her  attentions,  notably  a  violinist.  The  husband 
became  wildly  jealous,  particularly  so  one  evening  when 
his  wife  and  the  violinist  were  playing  together  the 
Kreutzer  Sonata  of  Beethoven,  music  that  in  a  drawing 
room,  where  there  are  women  in  decollete,  arouses, 
according  to  Tolstoy,  the  most  sensual  feelings.  Pozdny- 
shev left  home,  and  returned  late  at  night,  convinced  of 
his  wife's  falsity;  he  seized  a  dagger,  and,  finding  the 
woman  with  her  lover,  he  stabbed  her.     He  was  ac- 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;  "WHAT  IS  ART?**  313 

quitted  by  the  court  on  the  ground  of  having  been 
justified  in  his  vengeance. 

Among  all  Tolstoy's  works.  The  Kreutzer  Sonata  is 
the  most  horrible  in  its  plainness  of  speech — and  this 
despite  a  slight  modification  that  the  author  introduced 
at  the  urging  of  his  wife.  Tolstoy  lays  bare  the  crude 
medical  facts  of  life  without  the  faintest  gauzy  covering 
of  romanticism.  The  book  is  a  sermon  on  modern 
tampering  with  the  sex  instinct.  Its  readers  instinctively 
denounce  the  whole  sex  impulse  as  vile  and  low. 

The  Kreutzer  Sonata  raised  a  fury  of  disgust  in  so- 
ciety, a  fury  that  was  more  than  half  hypocrisy.  In 
America  it  was  for  a  time  forbidden  the  right  of  trans- 
mission through  the  mails,  as  an  immoral  work.  To 
explain  his  parable,  Tolstoy  added  a  postscript,  in  which 
he  details  the  Russian  attitude  to  the  sexual  life,  one 
very  different  from  the  English  Puritan  tradition.  Grati- 
fication of  the  sexual  instinct  is  not  regarded  as  a  sin, 
and  parents  teach  their  children  how  to  indulge  it 
without  risk  of  disease.  Married  men  have  intercourse 
with  their  wives  during  pregnancy,  thus  violating  the 
laws  of  nature.  Women  steriHze  themselves  that  they 
may  indulge  their  lusts  and  aid  men  in  lust  without 
the  bringing  forth  of  children,  the  only  thing  that  can 
justify  the  yielding  to  sexual  feeling.  All  this  Tolstoy 
denounces  as  bad.  The  way  out  is  not  to  compromise 
with  the  sex  feeling,  as  is  likely  to  be  the  case  in  mar- 
riage, but  to  strive  for  the  ideal  of  absolute  chastity. 
This  will,  he  admits,  lead  to  the  extinction  of  the  human 


314  TOLSTOY 

race.  But  no  one  has  proved  that  the  perpetuation  of  a 
lustful  race  is  in  itself  a  good.  As  the  race  advances  in 
self-control  it  may  well  die  out. 

We  have  seen  (page  259)  how  Tolstoy  had  written  in 
his  diary  in  1881:  "The  family  is  flesh.  To  abandon 
one's  family  is  the  second  temptation — to  kill  oneself. 
The  family  is  one  body.  But  do  not  yield  to  the  third 
temptation:  serve  not  the  family,  but  God  alone." 
Then  he  was  still  on  the  sane  ground  of  compromise,  of 
regulating  natural  impulses  rather  than  extinguishing 
them.  Now  asceticism  has  led  him  into  a  more  con- 
sistent position,  of  mortification  of  the  flesh.  He  writes 
in  his  Epilogue  to  The  Kreutzer  Sonata: 

I  was  horrified  at  my  own  conclusions  and  wished  not  to 
believe  them,  but  it  was  impossible  not  to  believe  them.  And 
however  much  these  conclusions  contradict  the  whole  order 
of  our  life,  however  much  they  contradict  what  I  previ- 
ously thought  and  even  expressed,  I  was  obliged  to  accept 
them. 

Passages  in  Tolstoy's  Journal  for  1897  and  1898  show 
his  altered  point  of  view: 

All  calamities  which  are  born  from  sex  relations,  from  being 
in  love,  come  from  this,  that  we  confuse  fleshly  lust  with 
spiritual  life,  with — terrible  to  say — love;  we  use  our  reason 
not  to  condemn  and  limit  this  passion,  but  to  adorn  it  with  the 
peacock  feathers  of  spirituality.  Here  is  where  les  extremes 
SG  touchent.  To  attribute  every  attraction  between  the  sexes 
to  sex  desire  seems  very  materialistic,  but,  on  the  contrary. 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  315 

it  is  the  most  spiritual  point  of  view:  to  distinguish  from  the 
realm  of  the  spiritual  everytliing  which  docs  not  belong  to  it, 
in  order  to  be  able  to  value  it  highly. — [The  Journal  of  Leo 
Tolstoi,  1895-1899 y  translated  by  Strunsky:    p.  154.] 

Yesterday  there  was  a  conversation  about  the  same  thing: 
Is  exclusive  love  [love  of  one  woman]  good.?  The  resume  is  this: 
a  moral  man  will  look  on  exclusive  love — it  is  all  the  same 
whether  he  be  married  or  single — as  on  evil  and  will  fight  it; 
the  man  who  is  little  moral  will  consider  it  good  and  will 
encourage  it.  An  entirely  unmoral  man  does  not  even  under- 
stand it  and  makes  fun  of  it. — [Ibid.,  p.  222.] 

No  student  of  the  religious  life,  or,  more  concretely, 
no  admirer  of  St.  Paul,  no  respecter  of  a  chaste,  celibate, 
duty-loving  priest,  can  throw  a  stone  at  Tolstoy  for  the 
conclusion  he  has  reached.  The  ascetic  impulse  created 
monasticism  in  Buddhism  and  in  Christianity.  Tolstoy 
after  his  religious  conversion  rejected  monasticism, 
maintaining  that  he  would  remain  in  the  world  and 
still  serve  God.*  But  now  he  advocates  an  ideal  that 
is  essentially  monastic;  his  aspirations  at  this  stage  of 
his  progress  might  be  summed  up  as  poverty,  chastity, 
and  c?z5obedience.  What  the  medieval  church  enjoined 
as  an  ideal  on  a  few  men  Tolstoy  announces  as  a  uni- 
versal human  duty;  his  now  democratic  soul  will  make 
no  distinction  between  monk  and  worldling,  priest  and 
layman.  The  church,  following  St.  Paul  and  other 
teachers,  separated  its  clergy  from  the  worldly  life  by 
depriving  them  of  wives,  not  to  speak  of  promiscuous 
*My  Religion^  ch.  10:  cf.  p.  250. 


316  TOLSTOY 

intercourse;  Tolstoy  will  prescribe  the  same  remedy  for 
all  men,  and  he  gives  reasons  for  his  doctrine  founded  on 
the  modern  conditions  that  he  sees  about  him.  But  he 
still  is  inconsistent:  suicide  would  be  the  next  logical 
step  in  self-abnegation,  and  that  Tolstoy  continues  to 
abhor.  Buddhists  and  Christians  may  be  withheld 
from  suicide  by  its  futility;  men  cannot  hope  to  escape  a 
temporal  life  after  death.  Tolstoy,  not  yet  restrained 
by  any  such  belief,  should  logically  have  accepted 
suicide  as  a  release  from  the  ills  of  the  flesh.  Suicide  by 
violence,  to  be  sure,  would  have  contradicted  his  cardinal 
principle  of  non-resistance  to  evil  by  violence:  for  this 
same  reason  he  rejects  self-mutilation  as  a  means  of 
attaining  chastity,  and  condemns  the  Russian  sect  of 
Eunuchs  for  their  practice  of  it.  By  violence  they 
hinder  the  production  of  future  generations  who  might 
attain  an  ideal  of  voluntary  chastity  unknown  to  them.* 
But  suicide  by  self-starvation  would  hardly  be  open  to 
this  objection;  it  would  be  only  the  extreme  develop- 
ment of  Tolstoy's  doctrine  of  self-denial.  Asceticism 
and  the  passion  for  renunciation  of  the  life  of  the  body, 
however,  never  led  Tolstoy  to  this  abyss.  Worthy  of 
admiration  are  his  clear  perception  that  any  ethical 
ideal,  to  be  sound,  must  be  valid  for  all  men  and  women, 
and  his  attempt,  however  inadequate,  to  justify  his 
position  on  that  basis.  Here,  as  has  been  noted  (page 
253),  he  is  a  follower  of  Kant,  a  rationalist.     Illogical 

*  On  the  Sex  Question  {Thoughts  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy,  collected  by  Vladimir 
Chertkdv).  .  ^ 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORJKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?'*  317 

though  his  doctrine  may  be,  it  is  at  least  more  consistent 
than  the  temporizing  systems  developed  mider  Buddhism 
and  Christianity,  with  their  prescription  of  varying  ideals 
for  priest  and  layman.  For  Tolstoy  the  moralist,  with 
his  doctrine  that  the  body  is  the  source  of  all  human  ills, 
the  sexual  impulse  must  ultimately  prove  wholly  re- 
pulsive. 

Father  Sergy  and  The  Devil  are  kindred  in  spirit  to 
The  Kreutzer  Sonata.  The  former  has  been  already 
mentioned  (page  286).  It  represents  woman  as  the 
great  temptress  of  man,  the  chief  obstacle  to  a  righteous 
life.  Father  Sergy  resists  the  seduction  of  a  beautiful 
courtesan  only  to  submit  later  to  that  of  a  merchant's 
daughter.  Yielding,  his  phrase  is:  "Marya,  you  are  a 
devil." 

The  devil  of  the  second  story  is  the  same.  A  young 
landowner  in  his  bachelor  days  has  an  intrigue  with  a 
peasant  woman.  After  his  marriage  to  a  woman  of  his 
own  class  temptation  from  his  former  mistress  returns 
upon  him.  Unable  to  resist,  he  kills  himself.  One 
thinks  of  Tolstoy's  confession  to  Maude,  that  his  desire 
for  women  was  the  hardest  to  overcome  of  all  his  animal 
passions,  and  of  his  entry  in  his  diary  for  1903;  "I  am 
now  experiencing  the  torments  of  hell:  I  remember  all 
the  abominations  of  my  former  life.  Those  recollections 
do  not  leave  me,  and  they  poison  my  life."*  He  notes 
characteristically  at  the  close  of  his  story  that  none 
could  comprehend  the  cause  of  the  suicide.  Sin  such  as 
*  Maude:  I.  52;  II,  402. 


318  TOLSTOY 

that  with  which  the  man  struggled  seemed  the  most 
commonplace  act  to  those  about  him. 

With  the  tone  of  these  works  one  may  compare  entries 
in  Tolstoy's  diary  for  August,  1898: 

Woman — ^and  the  legends  say  it  also — is  the  tool  of  the 
devil.  She  is  generally  stupid,  but  the  devil  lends  her  his 
brain  when  she  works  for  him.  Here  you  see,  she  has  done 
miracles  of  thinking,  far-sightedness,  constancy,  in  order  to 
do  something  nasty;  but  as  soon  as  something  not  nasty  is 
needed,  she  cannot  understand  the  simplest  thing;  she  can- 
not see  further  than  the  present  moment  and  there  is  no  self- 
control  and  no  patience  (except  child-birth  and  the  care  of 
children). 

All  this  concerns  women,  un-Christians,  unchaste  women, 
as  are  all  the  women  of  our  Christian  world.  Oh,  how  I  would 
like  to  show  to  women  all  the  significance  of  a  chaste  woman ! 
A  chaste  woman  (not  in  vain  is  the  legend  of  Mary)  will  save 
the  world. — [The  Journal  of  Leo  Tolstoi,  1895-1899,  translated 
by  Strunsky:  pp.  251,  252.] 

Strangely  enough,  while  Tolstoy  was  at  work  on  his 
acrid  denunciation  of  family  life  in  I'he  Kreutzer  Sonata 
he  was  also  writing  a  genial  comedy,  for  his  children 
to  present  at  private  theatricals.  The  Fruits  of  Enlighten- 
ment, The  zealot  had  not  absorbed  the  jocose  and  merry 
father. 

The  Fruits  of  Enlightenment  presents  to  us  a  well-to-do 
Russian  family,  in  ^^ch  the  father  is  a  spiritualist, 
and  the  mother  a  fanatic  on  the  germ  theory.  In 
seventeenth-century  England  it  would  have  been  called 


I 


LATEll  AUTISTIC  WORKS;    "WILiT  IS  ART?"  319 

a  comedy  of  "humors,"  of  eccentric  types.  The  thread 
of  action  is  suppHed  by  some  peasants,  who  have  come 
to  town  wishing  to  buy  land.  A  clever  chambermaid, 
Tanya,  at  a  spiritualistic  seance  contrives  to  trick 
her  master  Zvezdintsev  (Star-gazer)  into  signing  the 
deed.  The  character  of  Tanya  is  the  mainspring  of  the 
comedy.  Her  natural  good  sense  overcomes  the  pom- 
pous folly  of  the  master  and  mistress  and  their  learned 
friend  Professor  Krugosvetlov  (Round-the-world-boy). 
The  play  is  full  of  deliciously  humorous  situations  and 
excellent  comic  dialogue.  Tolstoy's  moral  enthusiasm 
is  here  tempered  by  fun;  he  pours  out  copious  ridicule 
on  aristocratic  gluttony  and  credulity.  Here  we  see  the 
Tolstoy  of  the  home  circle,  the  merry  contributor  to  the 
letter-box. 

In  the  earlier  portions  of  Resurrection,  which  were 
probably  written  about  1888,  there  are  pages  that  by 
their  impartial,  slightly  satirical  picture  of  Russian  high 
society  suggest  Tolstoy's  earlier  work.  But  the  book  as  a 
whole  is  a  controversial  pamphlet,  attacking  fiercely  both 
church  and  state. 

A  rich  young  Russian  of  gentle  birth.  Prince  Dmitry 
Nekhlyudov — the  name  is  the  same  as  that  of  one  of  the 
main  characters  in  Youth  and  in  some  others  of  Tolstoy's 
early  works — meets  at  his  aunts'  house  a  young  girl  of 
the  humblest  origin,  Katyusha,  who  lives  with  his  aunts 
half  as  protegee,  half  as  chambermaid.  Her  freshness 
and  girlish  charm  tempt  him,  and  he  seduces  her.  The 
scene  depicting  the  seduction,  while  wholly  free  from 


320  TOLSTOY 

sensual  details,  is  written  in  Tolstoy's  most  vivid  style. 
Nekhlyudov  deserts  Katyusha,  leaving  money  as  pay- 
ment for  his  crime.  The  girl,  he  is  told,  bears  a  child, 
and  is  expelled  from  the  house,  but  he  learns  nothing 
further  of  her.  In  reality  she  sinks  into  misery  and 
becomes  a  common  prostitute,  living  in  a  house  of  ill- 
fame.  To  this  place  comes  a  merchant,  bent  on  enjoy- 
ing himself  in  a  strange  city.  He  is  murdered  at  a  hotel, 
and  suspicion  falls  on  Katyusha,  who  has  been  his  com- 
panion. She  is  arraigned  for  the  crime,  and  Nekhlyudov 
is  drawn  as  a  juror  for  the  trial  of  the  case.  Seated  in 
the  box,  he  recognizes  the  accused  as  the  girl  whom  he  had 
corrupted  years  before.  A  wave  of  repentance  and 
contrition  sweeps  over  him.  At  the  trial,  through  a 
misunderstanding  on  the  part  of  the  jurors,  the  girl  is 
condemned  for  the  murder,  of  which  she  is  innocent,  and 
is  sentenced  to  life  exile  in  Siberia.  Nekhlyudov  seeks  in 
vain  to  have  the  sentence  reversed.  Overcome  by  re- 
morse, he  gives  up  his  position  in  society,  breaks  his 
engagement  with  a  rich  young  woman,  and  follows 
Katyusha  into  Siberia.  She  refuses  persistently  his 
offer  of  marriage.  At  last  a  pardon  comes  for  her  from 
the  tsar.  She  marries  one  of  her  fellow  exiles.  Ne- 
khlyudov finds  that  a  new  life  has  dawned  for  him  in  the 
spirit  of  Christ's  B.ve  commandments,  which  are  naturally 
those  expounded  by  Tolstoy  in  My  Religion,  A  con- 
version such  as  for  Tolstoy  was  the  work  of  years  takes 
place  in  Nekhlyudov  in  a  few  weeks. 

Into  Resurrection  Tolstoy  pours  out  all  his  contempt 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  321 

for  government  institutions,  above  all  for  courts  of  law 
and  for  prisons.  He  pictures  judges  and  advocates, 
who  condemn  men  for  crimes  for  which  they  themselves 
ar^  spiritually  responsible.  He  describes  the  types  of 
criminals  met  by  Katyusha  on  her  journey,  men  and 
women  who,  if  guilty,  have  been  led  astray  by  the 
hard  circumstances  of  life  rather  than  by  badness  of  heart. 
Meanwhile  a  priest  is  performing  a  mummery  called  a 
sacrament,  which  does  no  good  and  merely  extorts 
hard-earned  money  from  peasants;  and  a  fashionable 
EngHsh  preacher — the  reflection  of  a  real  missionary. 
Lord  Radstock — tells  idle  aristocrats  that  they  may  be 
saved  by  faith  in  the  merits  of  Christ  rather  than  by 
their  own  good  lives. 

In  technique.  Resurrection,  with  its  digressions  and 
its  discussions  of  social  questions,  reverts  to  Tolstoy's 
earlier  manner.  Though  it  lacks  the  comprehensive 
sympathy  of  War  and  Peace  and  Anna  Karenin,  it  has 
pages  of  wonderful  beauty  and  strength.  In  the  prison 
scenes  the  author's  insight  sheds  human  kindliness  over 
the  most  wretched  surroundings.  His  frankness  of 
speech,  however,  gave  offence,  though  to  a  less  degree 
than  in  The  Kreutzer  Sonata,  A  letter  of  the  English 
Quaker  John  Bellows  refers  to  the  matter: 

One  thing  I  had  to  get  through  at  our  last  Committee 
was  the  question  of  the  novel  Tolstoy  wrote  to  help  the  Dou- 
khobor  migration  expenses — Resurrection,  Our  people  received 
£150  of  the  proceeds;  but  the  work  is  an  objectionable  one 
in  its  giving  far  too  full  details  of  **smutty'*  things;  and  my  wife 


sn  TOLSTOY 

and  I  felt  wc  had  better  sacrifice  this  sum  ourselves  rather 
than  let  the  Society  of  Friends  be  in  complicity  with  its  publi- 
cation. So  I  paid  the  sum  back  out  of  my  own  pocket,  and 
then  wrote  Tolstoy  a  long  and  earnest  letter  on  the  subject, 
to  which  he  has  as  yet  not  sent  a  reply;  but  his  friend  who 
helped  the  translation,  etc.,  came  to  the  Committee  to  defend 
it  against  my  charges.  The  Committee,  however,  took  my 
view,  and  unanimously  condemned  the  work  as  unfit  for  our 
homes;  and  ordered  the  £150  to  be  refunded  to  me. 

Tolstoy's  delayed  reply  to  Bellows  was  as  follows: 

7th  of  December, '  1901. 
Dear  Friend, 

I  received  your  letter  and  meant  to  answer  it;  but  the  last 
two  months  I  have  been  so  weak  that  I  could  not  do  it,  so  you 
must  excuse  me  my  long  silence. 

I  read  your  letter  twice  and  considered  the  matter  as  well  as 
I  could,  and  could  not  arrive  at  a  definite  solution  of  the  ques- 
tion. You  may  be  right,  but  I  think  not  for  every  person  which 
[sic]  will  read  the  book.  It  can  have  a  bad  influence  over  per- 
sons who  will  read  not  the  whole  book  and  not  take  in  the  sense 
of  it.  It  might  also  have  quite  the  opposite  influence  so  as  it 
was  intended  to.  All  that  I  can  say  in  my  defence  is,  that  when 
I  read  a  book,  the  chief  interest  for  me  is  the  Weltanschauung 
des  Autors:  what  he  Hkes  and  what  he  hates.  And  I  hope 
that  the  reader  which  will  read  my  book  with  the  same  view 
will  find  out  what  the  author  Kkes  or  dislikes  and  will  be  in- 
fluenced with  the  sentiments  of  the  author,  and  I  can  say  that 
when  I  wrote  the  book  I  abhorred  with  all  my  heart  the  lust, 
and  to  express  this  abhorrence  was  one  of  the  chief  aims  of 
the  book, 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"    323 

If  I  have  failed  in  it  I  am  very  sorry,  and  I  am  pleading 
guilty  if  I  was  so  inconsiderate  in  the  scene  of  which  you  write 
that  I  could  have  produced  such  a  bad  impression  on  your 
mind. 

I  think  that  we  will  be  judged  by  our  conscience  and  by 
God,  not  for  the  results  of  our  deeds  which  we  cannot  know, 
but  for  our  intentions,  and  I  hope  that  my  intentions  were  not 
bad.  Yours  truly, 

Leo  Tolstoy.* 

As  to  matters  of  this  sort  there  may  be  a  legitimate 
difference  of  opinion.  One  may  note  that  in  1893  Tolstoy 
wrote  to  his  wife  that  it  was  "of  course  too  early" 
for  their  fourteen-year-old  son  Mikhail  to  read 
Anna  Kareninj\  And  when  The  Kreutzer  Sonata  was 
read  aloud  in  his  home  he  admitted  that  it  was 
"better  for  the  young  ladies  to  leave."  t 

In  The  Living  Corpse,  an  unfinished  drama,  a  drunken, 
worthless  fellow  disappears  from  sight  in  order  to  spare 
his  family  the  disgrace  of  his  presence.  Tolstoy  presents 
him  as  morally  superior  to  the  self-satisfied  followers  of 
convention  who  remain  respected  and  honored  members 
of  society.  For  once  Tolstoy  seems  to  have  adopted 
the  manner  of  Dostoyevsky. 

There  is  rare  charm  in  Hadji  Murad,  a  tale  which  by  its 
subject  matter  takes  us  back  to  the  days  of  Tolstoy's 
youthful  service  in  the  Caucasus.    Hadji  Murad  was  a 


*  John  Bellows:  Letters  and  Memoir  (London,  1905) :  pp.  361,  362. 

t  Letters  to  Wife,  p.  445. 

I  Tsinger,  in  On  Tolstoy,  p.  380. 


BU  TOLSTOY 

Mohammedan  warrior,  second  only  to  Shamil  himself  m 
his  tenacious  resistance  to  the  Russians.  Tolstoy  tells  his 
story  in  a  simple,  matter-of-fact  way,  with  full  delight  in 
his  physical  strength  and  bravery.  The  old  hunter  and 
warrior  was  never  quite  lost  in  Tolstoy  the  saint.  Tolstoy 
loved  adventure  even  in  books;  he  wrote  to  his  wife 
(1897)  that  the  death  of  Alexander  Dumas  had  affected 
him  in  the  same  way  as  that  of  Henry  George.*  The 
opening  paragraphs  of  Tolstoy's  tale  are  especially 
delightful: 

I  was  returning  home  through  the  fields.  It  was  mid- 
summer. They  had  already  mowed  the  meadows  and  were 
just  beginning  to  reap  the  rye. 

There  is  a  delightful  choice  of  flowers  at  that  time  of  year: 
red,  white,  and  pink  fragrant,  fluffy  clover;  milk-white  daisies 
with  their  bright  yellow  centers  and  pleasant  spicy  smell; 
yellow  rape,  with  its  scent  of  honey;  towering,  purple  and 
white,  tulip-like  campanulas;  creeping  vetch;  yellow,  red, 
and  pink  seabiosa;  regular,  purple  plantain,  with  a  faintly 
pinkish  down  and  a  barely  perceptible  pleasant  scent;  corn 
flowers,  bright  blue  in  the  sun  and  in  their  youth,  but  light 
blue  and  reddening  in  the  evening  and  as  they  grow  old;  and 
tender,  almond-scented,  quickly  withering  convolvulus. 

I  had  gathered  a  large  bouquet  of  various  flowers  and 
Jtv^as  walking  home,  when  I  noticed  in  the  ditch  a  marvelous 
purple  thistle  in  full  bloom,  of  the  sort  that  we  call  *' Tatar,** 
and  which  the  mowers  carefully  avoid,  and,  when  it  is  acci- 
dentally mown,  cast  out  from  the  hay,  in  order  not  to  prick 

*  Letters  to  Wife,  p.  532. 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  325 

their  hands  on  it.  The  thought  came  to  me  of  plucking  this 
thistle  and  putting  it  in  the  middle  of  my  bouquet.  I  stepped 
down  into  the  ditch,  and,  after  driving  away  a  bumble-bee 
that  had  nestled  down  into  the  center  of  the  flower  and  had 
there  gone  sweetly  and  idly  to  sleep,  I  set  to  plucking  the 
blossom.  But  this  was  very  hard:  the  stem  not  only  pricked 
me  from  all  sides,  even  through  the  handkerchief  that  I  had 
wrapped  around  my  hand,  but  was  so  terribly  tough  that  I 
struggled  with  it  for  some  five  minutes,  breaking  one  fiber 
after  another.  When  at  last  I  had  torn  off  the  flower,  the  stem 
was  all  in  shreds,  and  the  flower  no  longer  seemed  so  fresh 
and  beautiful.  Besides  this,  with  its  coarseness  and  roughness 
it  did  not  go  with  the  deHcate  flowers  of  the  bouquet.  I 
felt  sorry  that  I  had  uselessly  ruined  the  flower,  which  had 
been  good  in  its  own  place,  and  I  cast  it  aside.  **Yet  what 
energy  and  force  of  life,"  I  thought,  remembering  the  efforts 
with  which  I  had  torn  off  the  flower.  "With  what  vigor  it 
defended  itself  and  how  dear  it  sold  its  life. "... 

And  I  remembered  a  story  of  the  Caucasus  of  long  ago,  part 
of  which  I  had  seen,  part  heard  from  eye-witnesses,  and  part 
imagined. 

This  joy  in  flowers  appears  repeatedly  in  Tolstoy's 
letters.  In  truth,  the  love  of  beauty  was  always  one  of 
Tolstoy's  passions.  And  yet,  when  he  came  to  write  a 
treatise  on  esthetics,  in  What  is  Art?  (1898),  he  won 
fame,  or  shall  we  say  notoriety,  by  denying  that  beauty 
is  a  necessary  or  important  element  in  works  of  art. 

What  is  Art?  is  on  the  one  hand  an  expansion  of  the 
idea  as  to  the  popular,  infectious  character  of  great 
art  that  Tolstoy  had  expressed  twentj^-six  years  earlier 


326  TOLSTOY 

in  his  article  on  Yasnaya  Poly  ana  School{see  pp.  119-121), 
and  on  the  other  an  obvious  corollary  to  his  ethical 
system.  His  fundamental  thought,  and  fundamental 
error,  is  that  beauty  has  nothing  to  do  with  true  art. 
To  the  demolition  of  this  view  he  devotes  an  introduction 
in  which  he  reviews  the  theories  of  preceding  writers  on 
esthetics.  He  likewise  disapproves  of  the  attempt  to 
construct  a  definition  of  art  by  scientific  induction  from 
objects  of  art: 

All  existing  systems  of  esthetics  are  constructed  on  this 
plan.  Instead  of  giving  a  definition  of  true  art,  and  then 
deciding  what  is  and  what  is  not  art  by  judging  whether  a 
given  production  suits  or  does  not  suit  that  definition,  a 
certain  class  of  productions  that  for  some  reason  please  people 
of  a  certain  set  are  recognized  as  art,  and  a  definition  of  art 
is  devised  that  will  cover  all  these  productions. — [What  is  Art?, 
ch.  4.1 

Yet  Tolstoy's  own  definition  is  itself  founded  on  in- 
duction, though  on  an  induction  so  swift  and  simple 
that  he  does  not  recognize  it  as  such;  and  it  is  a  definition 
that  in  no  way  excludes  beauty  from  the  province  of 
art  or  even  prevents  it  from  being  an  essential  feature  of 
art.  His  definition  is,  briefly,  that  art  consists  in  the 
conscious  transfer  of  emotion: 

To  call  forth  in  oneself  a  feeling  that  has  been  once  ex- 
perienced, and,  after  calling  it  forth  in  oneself,  to  transfer 
that  feeling  by  means  of  movements,  lines,  colors,  sounds,  or 
images  expressed  in  words,  so  that  others  may  experience 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  327 

the  same  feeling — in  this  consists  the  activity  of  art.  Ai-t 
is  an  activity  of  man  which  consists  in  this,  that  one  man 
consciously,  by  certain  external  signs,  transfers  to  others 
feelings  experienced  by  him,  and  other  men  are  infected  with 
these  feelings  and  live  through  them. — [Ch.  5.J 

This  definition  belongs  to  the  emotionalist  school  of 
esthetics.  Tolstoy  has  taken  a  definition  by  Veron, 
which  he  cites  (ch.  3)  as:  "Art  is  the  manifestation  of 
feeling,  transferred  externally,  by  means  of  a  grouping 
of  lines,  forms,  or  colors,  or  by  a  succession  of  gestures, 
sounds,  or  words,  subjected  to  certain  rhythms,"*  and 
has  added  to  it  the  self-evident  supplement  that  the 
artist  must  so  express  his  emotion  that  it  will  be  felt  by 
other  men  who  come  in  contact  with  his  production. 

Obviously  this  definition,  if  accepted,  does  not  pre- 
vent beauty  from  being  an  important,  or  even  con- 
ceivably an  essential  element  in  art.  For  surely  the  sense 
of  pleasure  in  the  harmony  of  line,  color,  or  sound  is  an 
emotion  that  an  artist  may  experience  and  wish  to 
convey  to  others.  Tolstoy  sees  the  danger  and  vainly 
tries  to  escape  it.  He  has  admitted  that  ornaments  may 
be  objects  of  good  art.    He  then  adds : 

I  fear  that  here  I  shall  be  reproached  that,  while  denying 
that  the  concept  of  beauty  constitutes  an  object  of  art,  I 
here  once  more  recognize  beauty  as  an  object  of  art.  This 
reproach  is  unjust,  because  the  artistic  content  of  ornaments 
of  all  sorts  consists  not  in  their  beauty,  but  in  the  feeling  of 

*See  V^ron:  /Esthetics,  translated  by  Armstrong  (London,  1879), 
p.  89. 


328  TOLSTOY 

delight  and  admiration  for  a  combination  of  lines  or  colors 
which  the  artist  experiences  and  with  which  he  infects  the 
spectator.  Art  has  been,  is,  and  can  be  nothing  else  than 
the  infection  by  one  man  of  another  or  others  with  the  feeling 
which  the  infecter  has  experienced.  Among  these  feelings  is 
the  feeling  of  delight  in  what  pleases  the  sight.  And  objects 
that  please  the  sight  may  be  such  as  please  a  small  number 
of  men,  or  a  larger  number,  or  such  as  please  all  men.  And 
peculiarly  such  are  all  ornaments.  A  landscape  of  a  very 
exceptional  locality,  a  very  special  genre,  may  not  please  all, 
but  ornaments,  from  those  of  the  Yakuts  to  those  of  the 
Greeks,  are  accessible  to  all  and  arouse  the  same  feeling  of 
admiration  in  all,  and  therefore  in  a  Christian  community 
this  species  of  neglected  art  should  be  prized  much  more 
highly  than  exclusive,  pretentious  paintings  and  sculptures. — 
[What  Is  Artfy  ch.  16.] 

But  what  is  "the  feeling  of  delight  and  admiration  for 
a  combination  of  lines  or  colors"  except  the  sense  of 
beauty,  the  feeling  of  pleasure  in  an  artistic  production, 
which  Tolstoy  affects  so  to  despise.'^ 

Leaving  then  the  soundness  of  Tolstoy's  definition  of 
art  as  something  over  which  estheticians  may  wrangle, 
let  us  merely  point  out  that  the  definition  is  not  a  conse- 
quence of  his  ethical  theory,  is  not  moralistic;  and  that 
it  does  not  exclude  from  art  the  element  of  beauty: 
that  it  might  be  used,  by  critics  of  other  temperament 
than  his  own,  to  justify  works  of  art  that  he  condemns, 
and  to  condemn  those  that  he  praises.  Tolstoy's  pe- 
culiarity, his  originaHty,  lies  not  in  his  definition  of  art, 
but  in  his  use  of  that  definition;  and  namely,  in  his 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?'*  3^9 

instant  connection  with  it  of  his  whole  ascetico-al- 
tniistic  ethical  system.  This  connection  he  makes 
very  simply. 

Primarily,  all  purposed  communication  of  feeling  is 
art;  a  boy  meets  a  wolf  in  the  woods,  and  later,  telling 
of  the  incident  to  his  companions,  imparts  to  them  the 
feeling  of  fear  that  he  has  himself  experienced.    But — 

we  call  art  in  the  narrow  sense  of  the  word  not  all  human 
activity  that  communicates  feelings,  but  only  such  activity 
as  we  for  some  reason  separate  from  all  this  activity  and  to 
which  we  assign  special  significance.  Such  special  significance 
all  men  have  always  assigned  to  that  part  of  this  activity 
which  communicated  feelings  flowing  from  the  religious 
consciousness  of  men;  and  this  small  part  of  all  art  they  have 
called  art  in  the  full  sense  of  this  word. — [Ch.  5.] 

Hence  at  all  times  art  that  has  expressed  the  ideas  of 
the  reigning  religion  has  been  regarded  as  good  art, 
that  which  contradicted  it  as  bad  art: 

If  religion  places  the  sense  of  life  in  earthly  happiness, 
in  beauty  and  strength,  then  the  joy  and  vigor  of  life  com- 
municated by  art  will  be  regarded  as  good  art;  but  art  which 
communicates  a  feeling  of  effeminacy  or  dejection  will  be 
bad  art,  as  it  was  recognized  among  the  Greeks.  .  .  . 

Christianity  of  the  earliest  times  recognized  as  good  pro- 
ductions of  art  only  legends,  lives  of  saints,  sermons,  prayers, 
and  hymn-singing  that  evoked  in  men  feelings  of  love  for 
Christ,  tender  reverence  for  his  life,  desire  to  follow  his  ex- 
ample, renunciation  of  the  life  of  the  world,  humility  and 


330  TOLSTOY 

love  of  men;  but  all  productions  that  communicated  feelings 
of  personal  enjoyment  it  regarded  as  bad,  and  therefore  it 
rejected  all  heathen  plastic  art,  admitting  only  symbolic 
plastic  representations. — [What  Is  Artfy  ch.  6.] 

Ecclesiastic  Christianity,  though  a  corruption  of 
Christ's  teaching,  was  nevertheless  a  higher  conception 
than  paganism.  It  gave  birth  to  true  art,  in  architecture, 
painting,  sculpture,  music,  and  literature.  But  after 
the  Renaissance  men  lost  faith  in  the  church  and  did 
not  return  to  the  religion  of  primitive  Christianity, 
which  was  retained  or  attained  only  by  a  few  men  such 
as  Francis  of  Assisi  and  Chelcicky.  The  upper  classes, 
left  without  religion,  went  back  to  the  base  pagan  con- 
ception of  the  Greeks,  which  made  the  meaning  of  life 
consist  in  beauty  and  enjoyment,  a  conception  that 
Plato  had  already  condemned.  On  this  conception 
modern  art  is  based;  it  is  therefore  nothing  but  an  imita- 
tion of  pagan  art.  To  justify  this  pagan  art  men  have 
invented  esthetic  theories,  of  which  the  most  typical 
is  that  of  Baumgarten,  with  his  triad  of  the  Good,  the 
Beautiful,  and  the  True,  "from  which  it  appears  that 
the  best  that  can  be  done  by  the  art  of  nations  who  have 
lived  the  Christian  life  for  1800  years  consists  in  choosing 
as  the  ideal  of  their  life  the  one  held  2000  years  ago  by  a 
half-savage,  slave-holding  little  people,  which  imitated 
very  well  the  nakedness  of  the  human  body  and  erected 
buildings  pleasant  to  look  at."* 

*  What  is  Art  ?,  ch.  7.  Tolstoy  himself  had  once  believed  in  this 
triad:  see  p.  lOi^,  above. 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    **WHAT  IS  ART?"  331 

But  the  members  of  this  triad  are  in  no  way  coor- 
dinate : 

The  good  is  the  eternal,  highest  aim  of  our  life.  How- 
ever we  may  understand  the  good,  our  Hfe  is  nothing  else  than 
a  striving  towards  the  good,  that  is,  towards  God.  .   .  . 

But  beauty,  if  we  do  not  content  ourselves  with  words, 
but  speak  of  what  we  understand,  beauty  is  nothing  else  than 
what  pleases  us. 

The  concept  of  beauty  not  only  does  not  coincide  with  the 
good,  but  rather  is  opposed  to  it,  since  the  good  generally 
coincides  with  victory  over  our  inclinations,  while  beauty  is 
the  foundation  of  all  our  inclinations.  The  more  we  give  our- 
selves up  to  beauty,  the  more  we  withdraw  from  the  good.  .  .  . 

By  truth  we  mean  only  the  correspondence  of  the  ex- 
pression or  definition  of  an  object  with  its  essence,  or  with  the 
general  understanding  of  an  object  common  to  all  men.  What 
is  there  in  common  between  the  concepts  of  beauty  and  truth 
on  the  one  hand  and  that  of  good  on  the  other  ?  .  .  .  Truth  .  .  . 
is  one  of  the  means  for  the  attainment  of  the  good,  but  in  it- 
self truth  is  neither  the  good,  nor  beauty,  and  does  not  even 
coincide  with  them. — [Ch.  7.] 

In  these  pages  Tolstoy  reiterates  the  aversion  to 
modern  tendencies  in  science  and  art  that  he  had  already 
expressed  in  What  Shall  We  Do  Then  ?  Science  and  art 
in  themselves  he  never  rejected,  exclaiming  fervently: 

I  not  only  do  not  deny  science,  that  is,  the  rational  activity 
of  man,  and  art,  the  expression  of  that  rational  activity; 
but  only  in  the  name  of  that  rational  activity  and  its  ex- 
pressions do  I  say  what  I  say;  only  in  order  that  there  may  be 


832  TOLSTOY 

a  possibility  for  humanity  to  emerge  from  the  savage  con- 
dition into  which  it  Is  swiftly  falhng,  thanks  to  the  false  teach- 
ing of  our  time — only  for  this  do  I  say  what  I  say. 

Science  and  art  are  as  necessary  for  men  as  food  and  drink 
and  clothing,  even  more  necessary.  .  .  . 

[True]  science  has  always  had  as  its  subject  the  knowledge  of 
what  is  the  mission,  and  therefore  the-  true  good,  of  each  man 
and  of  all  men.  .  .  . 

Ever  since  men  have  existed,  true  art,  that  which  has  been 
highly  prized  by  men,  has  had  no  other  meaning  than  the 
expression  of  the  mission  and  the  good  of  man. 

Always  and  up  to  the  latest  times  art  has  served  the  teach- 
ing of  life,  what  was  later  termed  religion,  and  only  then 
was  it  what  men  prized  so  highly.  But  at  the  same  time 
that  into  the  place  of  the  science  of  the  mission  and  the  good 
of  men  there  stepped  a  science  about  anything  one  happens 
to  think  of — from  the  time  that  science  lost  its  sense  and 
meaning,  and  men  began  contemptuously  to  give  the  name 
religion  to  genuine  science — from  that  time  on  art  also  vanished 
as  an  important  activity  of  man. — [What  Shall  We  Do  Then  ?, 
ch.  36.] 

That  is  to  say,  science  has  abandoned  the  care  of  man's 
spiritual  welfare  in  order  to  devote  itself  to  his  bodily 
comfort.  Hence  the  useless  truth  of  modern  science  is 
even  detrimental  to  right  living.  This  rejection  has  been 
already  discussed  (pp.  276,  277).  Now  Tolstoy  states 
with  equal  fervor  his  rejection  of  modern  art:  he  who 
in  his  earlier  life  had  been  in  raptures  over  the  beauty  of 
Greek  literature,  above  all  of  the  pagan  Homer  (see  pp. 
68, 140;  cf.  p.  353);  he  who  so  loved  flowers,  which  are 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  333 

the  natural  emblems  of  something  else  than  Christian 
asceticism!  Since  the  later  pages  of  his  book  are  in 
part  deductions  from  the  principles  that  have  been  set 
forth,  we  may  pause  for  a  moment  to  examine  those 
principles. 

In  his  connection  of  art  with  religion,  Tolstoy  is 
absolutely  sound,  if  one  accepts  his  definition  of  religion. 
For  him  religion  is  not  a  system  of  dogmas,  promulgated 
from  a  supernatural  source  and  upheld  by  a  hieratic 
organization;  it  is  the  life  conception  of  each  individual 
man,  the  complex  of  fundamental  ideas  which  each 
man,  whether  consciously  or  unconsciously,  holds  as  to 
himself  and  his  relations  to  his  fellow  men  and  to  the 
general  world  order,  and  by  which  he  regulates  his 
conduct.  When  Tolstoy  says  that  a  man  lacks  religion, 
he  means  that  he  has  no  true  religion;  that  he  is  a 
pagan,  guided  by  the  lusts  of  the  flesh,  that  his  re- 
ligion is  that  of  the  animal  personality,  not  that  of  the 
rational  personality,  to  adopt  the  language  of  his  book. 
On  Life.  Now,  since  each  man's  art,  or  enjoyment  of 
other  men's  art,  expresses  his  personaUty,  it  must  be  re- 
ligious in  this  broad  sense  of  the  term.  All  art  is  religious 
in  embodying  a  certain  life  conception,  true  or  false, 
high  or  low.  Hence  no  man  can  possibly  condemn  art 
in  itself;  he  condemns  merely  the  art  of  men  who  hold 
another  life  conception  than  his  own.  Plato,  when  he 
banished  poets  from  his  ideal  republic,  did  not  like- 
wise banish  philosophers,  who  were,  in  his  day  at  least, 
equally  artists;  he  banished  merely  a  degraded  form  of 


334  TOLSTOY 

art,  a  lower  beauty  in  order  to  preserve  a  higher.  A 
truly  consistent  Puritan  would  find  the  rigid  lines  and 
the  aspiring  wooden  steeple  of  a  Massachusetts  meeting- 
house more  lovely  than  the  gorgeous  mundane  beauty 
of  the  Doges'  Palace;  if  he  does  not  do  so,  he  shows  that  a 
spark  of  the  fleshly  Adam  remains  within  him.  So 
Tolstoy,  when  he  says  that  all  modern  art  is  irreligious, 
means  that  it  does  not  express  his  own  type  of  ascetic 
Christian  altruism.  He  condemns  modern  art,  in 
general,  on  exactly  the  same  grounds  on  which  he 
condemns  modern  society.  If,  though  we  reject  Tolstoy's 
ethics,  we  find  much  inspiration  in  his  criticism  of 
modern  society,  so  we  may  find  much  that  is  admirable 
in  his  critique  of  modern  art.  He  is  on  the  other  side 
of  the  golden  mean  (a  term  that  he  would  despise) 
from  most  modern  tendencies.  But  his  departure  from 
that  mean  is  more  strident  in  his  criticism  of  art  than  in 
his  social  criticism.  For  a  man's  art,  more  frequently 
than  his  social  activity — and  with  good  reason — tends  to 
be  an  expression  of  his  unascetic,  unaltruistic  enjoy- 
ment of  life,  and  to  appeal  to  the  same  instincts  in  other 
men. 

The  first  consequence  of  the  irreligious  quality  of 
modern  art,  Tolstoy  continues,  is  that  it  has  become 
exclusive,  the  property  of  a  small  circle  of  men,  the 
irrehgious,  idle  upper  classes,  and  is  incomprehensible 
to  the  masses  of  toiling  humanity.  One  may  at  once 
query  whether  the  Sunday  newspapers  and  cheap 
magazines  that  furnish  reading  matter  to  the  toiling 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  335 

masses  of  the  United  States  are  more  religious  in  any 
sense  of  the  term  than  literature  of  a  more  exclusive 
type;  whether  the  moving-picture  shows  are  more  re- 
ligious than  the  Metropolitan  Art  Museum — but  we  must 
let  Tolstoy  state  his  case  without  interrupting  him  at 
every  turn.  This  exclusive  art,  he  proceeds  to  say,  has 
become  (1)  impoverished  in  content,  (2)  artificial  and 
obscure,  without  beauty  of  form,  which  is  synonymous 
with  clearness,  and  (3)  insincere  and  affected. 

The  classes  for  whom  modern  art  is  created  crave 
only  enjoyment.  Their  feelings  may  be  reduced  to 
three:  (a)  pride,  (b)  sexual  impulse,  and  (c)  the  weari- 
ness of  life.  To  these,  and  above  all  to  the  second, 
modern  art  must  pander.  It  has  become  affected  with 
an  erotic  mania. 

The  life  of  a  laboring  man  with  his  endlessly  various  forms 
of  toil  and  the  dangers  connected  with  them  on  the  sea  and 
mider  the  earth,  with  his  journeys,  with  his  association  with 
employers,  bosses,  comrades,  with  men  of  other  faiths  and 
nationalities;  with  his  struggle  with  nature  and  wild  animals, 
with  his  relations  to  domestic  animals;  with  his  labors  in  the 
forest,  on  the  prairie,  in  the  field,  orchard,  and  garden;  with 
his  relations  to  his  wife  and  children,  not  only  as  near  and 
dear  persons,  but  as  co-workers,  aiders  and  substitutes  in  toil; 
with  his  relations  to  all  economic  questions,  not  as  subjects  for 
ratiocination  or  vanity,  but  as  questions  of  life  for  him- 
self and  his  family;  with  his  pride  of  self -contentment  and 
service  to  men;  with  his  joys  of  repose;  with  all  these  in- 
terests penetrated  by  a  religious  relation  to  these  phenomena — 
to  us,  who  have  not  these  interests  and  have  no  religious 


336  TOLSTOY 

understanding,  to  us  this  life  seems  monotonous  in  com- 
parison with  those  little  pleasures  and  insignificant  cares  of 
our  life,  not  of  toil  and  not  of  creation,  but  of  employment 
and  destruction  of  what  others  have  done  for  us. — [What  is 
Art?,  eh.  9.] 

In  the  second  place,  art  destined  only  for  a  class 
strives  to  develop  a  peculiar  means  of  expression,  com- 
prehensible only  to  the  initiated.  It  becomes  obscure, 
hazy,  mystical,  symbolic,  expressing  itself  only  by 
hints.  The  most  striking  examples  of  this  are  the 
French  decadent  poets,  Verlaine  and  his  school.  Their 
works  are  incomprehensible  to  Tolstoy  and  his  fellows, 
trained  in  the  habits  of  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  But  similarly,  Tolstoy  continues,  the  artists 
whom  his  own  contemporaries  have  learned  to  prize 
are  unintelligible  to  the  mass  of  humanity.  Laborers 
and  many  who  are  not  laborers  can  make  nothing  of 
Goethe,  Schiller,  Hugo,  Dickens,  Beethoven,  Chopin, 
Raphael,  Michelangelo,  or  Leonardo  da  Vinci. 

Becoming  constantly  poorer  in  content  and  more 
obscure  in  form,  modern  art  has  finally  ceased  even  to 
be  sincere;  it  has  ceased  to  be  real  art  and  has  become 
only  the  imitation  of  art: 

Universal  art  arises  only  when  some  man  of  the  people, 
having  experienced  a  strong  feeling,  has  the  need  of  com- 
municating it  to  men.  But  the  art  of  the  rich  arises  not 
because  of  the  artist's  need  for  it,  but  mainly  because  men  of 
the  higher  classes  require  amusements,  for  which  they  give 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  837 

large  rewards.  The  men  of  the  rich  classes  require  from  art 
the  transfer  of  feelings  pleasant  to  them,  and  the  artists 
try  to  satisfy  these  requirements.  But  to  satisfy  these  require- 
ments is  very  hard,  since  men  of  the  rich  classes,  passing  their 
lives  in  idleness  and  luxury,  require  unceasing  amusements 
from  art;  but  art  even  of  the  very  lowest  order  cannot  be 
produced  at  will:  it  must  be  born  in  the  artist  of  its  own  ac- 
cord. And  therefore  artists,  in  order  to  satisfy  the  demands  of 
men  of  the  higher  classes,  have  been  obliged  to  develop  methods 
by  means  of  which  they  might  produce  objects  similar  to  art. 
And  these  methods  have  been  developed.  They  are  the 
following:  (1)  borrowing,  (2)  imitation,  (3)  strikingness,  (4) 
entertainingness. 

The  first  method  consists  in  borrowing  from  former  pro- 
ductions of  art  either  whole  subjects  or  only  separate  traits  of 
former  poetic  productions  that  are  known  to  every  one,  and  in 
working  them  over  in  such  a  way  that  with  some  additions 
they  present  something  new.  ,  .  .  Thus  in  our  circle  legends, 
sagas,  old  traditions  of  all  sorts  are  regarded  as  poetic  subjects. 
Maidens,  warriors,  shepherds,  hermits,  angels,  devils  in  all 
forms,  moonlight,  thunderstorms,  mountains,  the  sea,  pre- 
cipices, flowers,  long  hair,  lions,  a  lamb,  a  dove,  a  nightingale, 
are  regarded  as  poetic  persons  and  objects.  .  .  . 

The  essence  of  the  second  method  consists  in  reproducing 
the  details  that  accompany  what  is  described  or  represented. 
In  the  literary  art  this  method  consists  in  describing  to  the 
smallest  details  the  external  form,  the  faces,  the  clothes,  the 
gestures,  the  sounds,  the  habitations  of  the  actors,  with 
all  the  accidental  circumstances  that  are  met  with  in 
life.  .  .  . 

The  third  method  is  an  action  on  the  external  feelings,  an 
action  often  of  a  quite  physical  sort — what  is  called  striking- 


338  TOLSTOY 

ness  or  effectiveness.  These  effects  in  all  the  arts  consist 
mainly  in  contrasts :  in  the  juxtaposition  of  the  awful  and  the 
tender,  the  beautiful  and  the  ugly,  the  loud  and  the  soft,  the 
dark  and  the  bright,  the  most  ordinary  and  the  most 
unusual.  .  .  . 

The  fourth  method  is  entertainingness,  that  is,  an  intellectual 
interest  joined  to  a  production  of  art.  Entertainingness  may 
consist  in  a  complicated  plot,  a  method  which  no  long  time 
ago  was  much  employed  in  English  novels  and  in  French 
comedies  and  dramas,  but  has  now  begun  to  go  out  of  fashion, 
and  has  been  replaced  by  documentality,  that  is,  by  a  cir- 
cumstantial description  either  of  some  historic  period  or  of 
some  separate  Ibranch  of  contemporary  life.  Thus  for  instance 
entertainingness  consists  in  describing  in  a  novel  Egyptian  or 
Roman  life,  or  the  life  of  miners,  or  of  clerks  in  a  large  shop; 
and  the  reader  is  interested  and  takes  this  interest  for  an 
artistic  impression. — [What  Is  Art?,  ch.  11.] 

Of  all  these  methods  Tolstoy  gives  copious  examples, 
condemning  in  the  process  most  of  modern  art,  such 
as  that  of  Ibsen,  Maeterlinck,  Puvis  de  Chavannes, 
Brahms,  and  above  all  Wagner,  to  whom  he  devotes  a 
most  entertaining  tirade. 

Leaving  out  of  account  the  question  of  the  subject 
matter  of  art,  true  art  is  distinguished  from  false  art 
by  its  infectiousness,  by  the  degree  to  which  it  affects 
the  feelings  of  all  men: 

The  stronger  the  infection,  the  better  is  the  art  as  art, 
leaving  out  of  account  the  subject  matter — that  is,  independ- 
ently of  the  worth  of  the  feelings  that  the  art  transfers. 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?'*  33D 

Alt  becomes  more  or  less  infectious  in  consequence  of  three 
conditions:  (1)  in  consequence  of  the  greater  or  less  individu- 
ality of  the  feeling  that  is  transferred;  (:2)  in  consequence  of  the 
greater  or  less  clearness  of  the  transfer  of  that  feeling;  (3)  in 
consequence  of  the  sincerity  of  the  artist,  that  is,  the  greater 
or  less  force  with  which  the  artist  himself  experiences  the  feeling 
that  he  transfers. — [Ch.  15.] 

Quite  aside  from  these  universal  artistic  conditions, 
the  subject  matter  of  art  changes  as  mankind  advances 
in  spiritual  vision.  At  present  all  true  art  must  transfer 
not  pagan  feelings,  but  Christian  feelings,  the  love  of 
God  and  the  love  of  one's  neighbor: 

Christian  art  either  arouses  in  men  those  feelings  that 
through  love  of  God  and  of  one's  neighbor  draw  them  to  ever 
greater  and  greater  unity,  and  so  makes  them  ready  and  ca- 
pable of  that  unity;  or  else  it  arouses  in  them  those  feelings 
that  show  them  that  they  are  already  united  by  a  unity  of  life's 
joys  and  sorrows.  And  therefore,  the  Christian  art  of  our 
time  may  be  and  is  of  two  sorts:  (1)  art  that  transfers  feel- 
ings that  flow  from  the  religious  consciousness  of  the  position 
of  man  in  the  world,  in  relation  to  God  and  to  his  neighbor — 
religious  art,  and  (2)  art  transferring  the  most  simple  feelings 
of  life,  but  such  as  are  accessible  to  all  men  of  all  the  world — the 
art  of  common  Ufe,  of  a  whole  nation,  of  all  the  world.  Only 
these  two  species  of  art  may  be  regarded  as  good  art  in  our 
time.— [Ch.  16.] 

As  examples  of  the  first  type  of  art,  religious  art,  in 
modern  times,  Tolstoy  cites  Hugo's  Les  Mis  Arables, 
Dickens'  novels,  especially  A  Tale  of  Two  Cities  and  The 


340  Tolstoy 

Chimes,  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,  Adam  Bede,  and  Dos- 
toyevsky's  works,  especially  his  House  of  the  Dead, 
He  cannot  cite  modern  literary  works  of  the  second 
type,  universal  art.  Even  Moliere*s  comedies,  Don 
Quixote,  David  Copperfield,  and  some  works  of  Maupas- 
sant, which  approach  this  type,  are  spoiled  by  the  ex- 
clusiveness  of  the  feelings  transferred,  by  an  excess  of 
special  details  of  time  and  place,  and  by  poverty  of 
content.  The  great  model  of  this  type  of  art  is  the 
biblical  story  of  Joseph  and  his  Brethren. 

Such,  in  brief,  is  the  content  of  Tolstoy's  book  on  art, 
which,  despite  its  shortcomings,  may  be  pronounced 
the  most  stimulating  critical  work  of  our  time,  perhaps 
of  all  modern  times.  Tolstoy's  definition  of  art  is  emo- 
tionalistic,  and,  quite  properly,  has  nothing  to  do  with 
morals.  In  estimating  works  of  art,  however,  he  has  two 
criteria,  the  first  emotibnalistic,  relating  to  the  infectious 
quality  of  the  work  considered;  the  second  moralistic, 
relating  to  its  subject  matter.  It  is  obvious  that  he  is 
still  actuated  by  the  same  impulses  that  in  1862  made 
him  condemn  Beethoven  and  Pushkin  because  they  are 
unintelligible  to  Russian  peasants.*  Now,  however,  he 
has  added  to  his  demand  for  universal  art  a  demand  for 
an  art  that  shall  express  the  Christian  doctrines  of  self- 
sacrifice  and  love. 

Tolstoy's  different  criteria  cannot  be  applied  sep- 
arately; the  emotionalistic  and  the  moralistic  must  be 
mingled.  Infectiousness  is  not  an  adequate  test  of  art; 
*  Compare  p.  119,  above. 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  341 

a  well-simulated  laugh  or  shout  of  pain  will  convey 
emotion  to  a  baby  or  an  idiot  for  whom  the  tale  of 
Joseph  and  his  Brethren  will  be  unintelligible.  Again,  a 
clever  smutty  story,  a  tavern  jest  passed  about  by  vulgar 
boys,  unfortunately  appeals  to  as  universal  human  emo- 
tions as  the  story  of  Joseph.  Thus  the  two  classes  of  good 
art  may  be  at  times  opposed  to  each  other.  Adam  Bede 
and  A  Tale  of  Two  Cities^  Tolstoy  must  admit,  are 
clogged  with  an  excess  of  transient  details  that  make 
them  exclusive  rather  than  universal  art.  One  is  amazed 
that  Tolstoy  has  not  cited  the  parable  of  the  Prodigal 
Son,  which  belongs  to  both  his  classes  of  good  art. 

Finally,  if  Tolstoy's  ethical  system  is  narrow  and 
limited,  as  we  have  tried  to  show,  then  the  art  criticism 
based  on  it  may  be  equally  narrow  and  limited.  Works 
of  art  conveying  the  emotions  of  power  and  beauty,  the 
Iliad  and  the  Song  of  the  NibelungSy  Macbeth  and  Para- 
dise Lost,  may  be  as  worthy  of  admiration  as  Uncle 
Tom*s  Cabin.  They  may  even  become  universal  art  in 
Tolstoy's  sense  of  the  term;  the  story  of  the  Iliad 
has  appealed  to  successive  generations  of  American 
boys,  and  Paradise  Lost  in  a  prose  translation  is  one  of 
the  favorite  books  of  the  Russian  common  people.  If 
modern  society  must  be  fundamentally  transformed,  as 
Tolstoy  argues  in  What  Shall  We  Do  Then?,  then  its 
art  must  be  similarly  uprooted.  But  if  society  is  capable 
of  reform  without  change  in  its  inmost  characteristics, 
then  its  art  may  be  similarly  lopped  and  pruned  rather 
than  cut  out  root  and  branch.    In  his  crusade  against 


342  TOLSTOY 

art  that  is  really  immoral  Tolstoy  has  attacked  art  that 
merely  fails  to  conform  to  his  own  special  type  of  ascetic 
and  altruistic  morality.  Power  and  beauty  may  retain 
a  place  in  the  world  along  with  self-sacrifice  and  love  of 
one's  neighbor. 

Then  what  value  remains  in  Tolstoy's  doctrine? 
One  may  reply  at  once  that,  just  as  his  teaching  of  the 
moral  purpose  of  art  contains  a  fundamental  truth, 
though  his  conception  of  morality  is  limited,  so  his 
theory  of  the  universality  of  true  art  contains  a  kernel, 
or  more  than  a  kernel,  of  truth.  China  dolls,  which 
Tolstoy  correctly  classes  as  objects  of  universal  art, 
are  not  so  lovely  as  the  Venus  of  Milo,  but  only  fanatics 
would  care  to  have  all  dolls  destroyed  forever  and  the 
beautiful  Venus  preserved  at  that  price.  Folk  songs  may 
not  be  on  the  same  esthetic  plane  as  Beethoven's  sym- 
phonies, but  we  should  have  no  hesitation  which  to 
sacrifice.  We  may  go  still  further  and  say  that  one 
would  gladly  part  with  all  artistic  fiction,  from  Daphnis 
and  Chloe  to  Anatole  France,  if  that  were  the  sole 
condition  on  which  folk  tales  like  that  of  Joseph  and 
his  Brethren  might  be  preserved.  But  fortunately  no 
such  alternatives  will  ever  be  presented  to  mankind; 
china  dolls  and  the  Venus  of  Milo  live  at  peace  together. 

Furthermore,  we  recognize  in  the  songs  of  Burns, 
with  their  universal  appeal,  a  higher  artistic  quality 
than  in  the  lyrics  of  Swinburne.  The  general  human 
interest  of  the  first  adds  to  their  artistic  value.  Rohinson 
Crusoe,  The  Pilgrim's  Progress,  and  Tom  Sawyer  woo 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  343 

popular  success  before  their  merits  were  admitted  by 
professional  critics. 

Still  further,  all  eccentric,  extravagant  writers,  such 
as  Lyly,  Marini  or  Gongora,  who  through  certain  affec- 
tations appealed  to  a  small  literary  set,  have  become 
mere  objects  of  historic  study,  while  Chaucer,  Moliere, 
and  Cervantes  give  delight  to  successive  generations. 
Shakespeare  lives  by  his  appeal  to  fundamental  human 
emotions,  not  by  his  whimsicality  of  style  in  Lovers  Labor's 
Lost. 

Yet,  despite  Tolstoy,  we  must  admit  that  a  certain 
cultivation,  a  training  of  the  taste,  is  required  for  the 
appreciation  of  some  really  great  authors,  such,  not- 
ably, as  Dante,  whom  Tolstoy  condemns  as  "ex- 
clusive" (ch.  16),  or  even  classes  among  writers  of  pro- 
ductions that  are  "coarse,  savage,  and  for  us  almost 
senseless"  (ch.  12).  But  that  cultivation  must  be  such 
as  does  not  stifle  fundamental  human  feelings.  The 
qualities  that  make  Dante's  thought  valuable  are  those 
of  our  common  humanity;  he  is  a  man  whole  and  well- 
proportioned.  To  understand  him  we  have  to  take 
pains  in  order  to  overcome  certain  external  obstacles,  but 
we  are  rewarded.  Only  a  special  student  will  make  similar 
efforts  to  comprehend  the  whinasicalities  of  Donne  and 
Cowley.  An  admirer  of  Swinburne  is  obliged  to  acknowl- 
edge his  shortcomings;  he  rightly  admires  his  beauty 
of  line,  but  confesses  that  to  appreciate  him  one  must 
lay  aside  for  the  moment  intellectual  and  moral  criteria 
and  give  himself  up  to  purely  sensuous  enjoyment, 


344  TOLSTOY 

In  discussing  critical  principles  in  What  is  Art?  Tol- 
stoy as  a  rule  does  not  generalize  from  his  own  practice. 
Tolstoy  the  moralist  is  now  speaking,  not  Tolstoy  the 
master  of  realistic  fiction.  By  his  attack  on  imitation 
he  condemns  the  very  method  of  which  he  was  the 
unrivaled  master.  His  passion  for  simplicity  now  makes 
him  worship  the  unadorned  narrative  of  the  folk  tale. 
Work  approaching  this  type  he  had  done  himself,  and 
from  his  own  labors — most  of  which  he  classes  as  bad 
art — he  singles  out  for  praise  the  stories  God  Sees  the 
Truth  and  The  Prisoner  of  the  Caucasus/^  Fine  as  those 
stories  are  in  their  own  kind,  one  may  rejoice  that  he 
rescued  and  completed  the  manuscript  of  Resurrection, 
One  should  add,  in  his  justification,  that  he  himself 
always  used  imitation  as  an  aid  in  the  transfer  of  emotion. 
A  bit  of  his  conversation  on  this  point  is  more  en- 
lightening than  his  drastic  condemnation  of  imitation  in 
What  is  AH? 

No  trifle  can  be  neglected  in  art,  because  sometimes  a  half- 
torn-off  button  may  light  up  a  certain  side  of  the  life  of  a  given 
person.  And  the  button  must  be  pictured  without  fail.  But 
all  one's  efforts,  and  even  the  half-torn-off  button,  must 
be  directed  exclusively  to  the  inner  essence  of  the  matter, 
and  not  distract  the  attention  from  what  is  central  and  im- 
portant to  details  and  trifles,  as  continually  happens.  Some 
contemporary  writer,  describing  the  adventure  of  Joseph  with 
Potiphar's  wife,  would  be  sure  to  seize  the  chance  of  showing 

*  Included  in  his  Third  and  Fourth  Readers  (see  p.  88) ;  the  second 
must  not  be  confused  witl^  Pushkin's  poem  of  the  same  title  (see 
p.  50) 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  345 

off  his  knowledge  of  life,  and  would  write:  "  *  Come  unto  me,' 
languidly  uttered  the  wife  of  Potiphar,  stretching  out  to 
Joseph  her  hand,  tender  from  aromatic  ointments,  with  such 
and  such  accessories,"  and  so  forth.  And  all  these  details 
would  not  only  not  light  up  more  brightly  the  essence 
of  the  matter,  but  would  inevitably  make  it  dim. — [Sergey en- 
ko:  Haw  Count  Tolstoy  Lives  and  Works  (Moscow,  1898), 
p.  65.] 

On  the  other  hand,  in  his  condemnation  of  borrowing^ 
strikingness,  and  entertainingness,  Tolstoy  utters  prin- 
ciples that  relate  more  to  his  own  practice  than  to  his 
moral  system.  For  it  is  hard  to  see  any  discrepancy 
between  "borrowing"  such  as  Tolstoy  censures  and 
either  universality  or  the  Christian  ideal  of  love  expressed 
in  art,  such  as  he  advocates.  It  is  in  his  own  moral 
tales,  which  are  really  those  least  congenial  to  his 
creative  impulse,  that  Tolstoy  is  most  apt  to  borrow. 
Here  he  uses  "hermits,  angels,  and  devils,"  borrowed  from 
previous  stories  and  "regarded  as  poetic  persons." 
In  his  novels  he  had  depended  on  life  itself,  not  on  such 
conventional  accessories.  Similarly  he  had  scorned  to 
decorate  War  and  Peace  with  "entertaining"  details 
of  a  by-gone  time  such  as  furnish  half  the  charm  of 
Ivanhoe.  Accepting  Tolstoy's  own  definition  of  art, 
why  should  not  a  writer  who  feels  the  picturesqueness 
of  a  medieval  tournament  seek  to  infect  others  with 
that  feeling  .f^  In  reply  Tolstoy  might  assert  that 
such  trifles  have  no  meaning  for  a  man  with  the 
Christian  ideal  of  life.     But  as  a  matter  of  fact  he 


S46  TOLSTOY 

had  scorned  such  ornaments  long  before  his  moral 
ideal  became  fixed.  So  it  is  with  strihingness,  obvious 
rhetorical  devices  of  antithesis  and  exaggeration. 
These  the  young  Tolstoy  had  disliked  so  much 
that  Turgenev  had  written  of  him  in  1862:  "The 
fear  of  phrases  has  driven  Tolstoy  into  the  most 
desperate  phrases." 

The  inmost  convictions  of  Tolstoy  the  artist  appear 
when  he  pronounces  the  central  qualities  of  truly  infec- 
tious art  to  be  individuality,  clearness,  and  sincerity. 
What  he  means  by  these  terms  he  makes  more  plain  in 
his  notable  Preface  to  the  Works  of  Guy  de  Maupassant 
(1894). 

Maupassant,  Tolstoy  tells  us,  "possessed  that  special 
gift  called  talent,  which  consists  in  the  capacity  of 
intense,  concentrated  attention  directed  on  some  object 
or  other,  according  to  the  tastes  of  the  author,  whereby 
a  man  gifted  with  that  capacity  sees  in  the  objects  on 
which  he  directs  his  attention  something  new,  something 
that  others  do  not  see."  This  is  obviously  artistic  in- 
dividuality. Clearness  also  Maupassant  possessed,  and 
clearness,  Tolstoy  here  tells  us,  is  synonymous  with 
beauty  of  form. 

In  this  dictum  an  essential  characteristic,  and  an 
essential  weakness,  of  Tolstoy  the  artist  is  made  plain. 
To  refute  the  statement  that  beauty  is  synonymous 
with  clearness  is  hardly  worth  while;  the  matter  is 
a  commonplace  of  our  rhetorics.  "Your  father  Hes 
in  water  five  fathoms  deep;    his  bones  have  turned 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  347 

into  coral  and  his  eyes  into  pearls,*'  is  no  less  clear 
than : 

Full  fathom  five  thy  father  lies; 
Of  his  bones  are  coral  made; 
Those  are  pearls  that  were  his  eyes. 

But  there  is  a  decided  difference  in  the  beauty  of  form  of 
the  two  passages !  Tolstoy  might  reply  with  justice  that, 
though  the  first  passage  conveys  information  even  more 
clearly  than  the  second,  the  second  is  clearer  in  the 
transference  of  emotion.  But  there  is  nothing  in  his 
writings  to  hint  at  such  a  retort,  and  much  that  points 
in  the  contrary  direction.  Tolstoy  once  expressed  regret, 
for  example,  that  Matthew  Arnold  had  not  written  in 
prose  such  poems  as  Rugby  Chapel  and  Self-dependence* 
He  himself  made  almost  no  attempts  at  the  writing  of 
serious  verse.  More  than  this,  though  he  revised  his 
works  of  fiction  with  the  minutest  care,  he  seems  never 
to  have  striven  for  music  of  style,  for  beauty  of  language 
as  distinguished  from  beauty  of  substance.  He  strives 
to  render  clearly  the  joy  of  Levin  or  of  Nikolay  Rostov  in 
the  sunlight  and  the  fresh  air,  but,  like  the  men  whom 
he  is  describing,  he  never  drops  into  poetic  phrases. 
Hence  Tolstoy,  of  all  the  greatest  literary  masters, 
suffers  least  in  translation.  To  render  him  well  an  exact 
knowledge  of  Russian  is  required,  and  a  vigorous,  supple 
command  of  English,  but  no  exceptional  power  of  sug- 
gestive expression. 
*  Maude:  Tolstoy  and  his  Problems,  p,  X93;  compare  pp.  21,  22,  above. 


848  TOLSTOY 

Tolstoy's  passion  for  clearness  of  expression  is  the 
key  to  his  attitude  towards  music.  Of  music  he  was 
passionately  fond;  yet  in  his  later  years,  as  he  makes 
plain  in  The  Kreutzer  Sonata,  he  seems  to  have  absolutely 
feared  its  influence.  For  music  arouses  the  emotions 
without  giving  them  a  definite  direction  towards  either 
good  or  evil. 

Sincerity  also  Maupassant  possessed,  "an  unfeigned 
feeling  of  love  or  hatred  to  what  the  artist  represents." 
But  Maupassant  lacked  any  firm  moral  point  of  view,  so 
that  much  of  his  work,  despite  the  talent  shown  in  it, 
is  vicious  and  untrue  to  life's  real  meaning.  He  was 
apt  to  regard  men  and  women  as  animals,  controlled 
only  by  greed  and  sex  impulse.  His  work,  admirable 
on  the  side  of  artistic  method,  transfers  feelings  that 
are  base  and  ignoble.  No  bit  of  criticism  is  more  im- 
pressive than  Tolstoy's  lecture  to  Maupassant  on  this 
theme;  the  greatest  of  realists  rebukes  a  craftsman  who 
hid  his  lack  of  soul  by  his  mastery  of  technique. 

Of  another  sort  is  Tolstoy's  celebrated  attack  on 
Shakespeare,  in  his  essay.  On  Shakespeare  and  the  Drama 
(1906),  in  which  he  stigmatizes  Shakespeare  as  "an  insig- 
nificant, inartistic  author,  not  only  not  moral,  but  di- 
rectly immoral"  (ch.  8).  In  judging  this  essay  one 
must  allow  for  Tolstoy's  vein  of  contradiction;  he  once 
confessed  to  his  wife:  "I  should  involuntarily  loathe  a 
man  of  whom  they  talked  so  much  rubbish  [as  myself]."* 
The  essay  is,  further,  an  old  man's  work,  lacking  the  vigor 
*  Letters  to  Wife,  p.  560. 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?'*  349 

and  cogency  of  his  earlier  pieces,  and  it  was  written 
without  adequate  knowledge  of  the  subject,  with  some 
misstatements  of  fact.  And  yet,  after  making  all  these 
allowances,  it  is  a  critical  utterance  worthy  of  great 
respect.  Tolstoy  points  out  real  defects  in  Shakespeare 
and  admits  real  excellences;  his  divergence  from  sounder 
critics  is  in  his  comparative  estimate  of  those  defects 
and  excellences. 

Tolstoy's  primary  charge  against  Shakespeare  is  that 
he  lacked  any  religious  view  of  life.  This  is  true  and 
just;  we  admire  Shakespeare  for  his  "cloudless,  bound- 
less human  view,"  not  for  any  underlying  unity  of  view 
as  to  man  and  his  problems  such  as  is  found  in  many 
lesser  authors,  let  us  say  in  Milton  and  in  Bunyan. 
Shakespeare,  in  Emerson's  phrase,  was  "master  of  the 
revels  to  mankind";  he  suggests  queries  as  to  all  manner 
of  human  relations,  but  on  the  fundamental  problem 
of  human  destiny,  as  to  man's  mission  here  on  earth 
and  his  relation  to  the  infinite,  the  question  that  would 
not  let  Tolstoy  rest,  he  is  silent.  This  radical  difference 
in  temperament  blinds  Tolstoy  as  to  the  glory  of  Shake- 
speare's unreligious  art.  One  may  remark,  and  Tolstoy 
might  sadly  admit  the  justice  of  the  charge,  that  it 
would  be  possible  to  make  a  cento  of  passages  from  War 
and  Peace  that  would  give  a  Shakespearian  impression 
of  unthinking  delight  in  the  world  of  men  here  on 
earth.  Shakespeare  had  but  one  side,  that  of  contempla- 
tion of  the  world  as  it  is,  while  to  this  Tolstoy  added 
spiritual  enthusiasm  for  making  it  a  better  world.    The 


350  TOLSTOY 

creator  of  Stiva  Oblonsky  is  repelled  by  Falstaff,  but 
then  on  occasion  he  would  be  repelled  by  his  own  crea- 
tion as  well. 

Tolstoy  also  denies  Shakespeare  "external  beauty, 
attained  by  a  technique  proper  to  a  certain  type  of  art. 
Thus,  in  dramatic  art  the  technique  will  be:  a  truthful 
style,  corresponding  to  the  characters  of  the  persons; 
a  natural  and  at  the  same  time  touching  plot;  a  regular 
conduct  of  the  scenes;  manifestation  and  development 
of  feeling;  and  a  feeling  of  measure  in  all  that  is  repre- 
sented" (ch.  6).  On  the  other  hand  he  grants  to 
Shakespeare  the  ability  to  express  the  play  of  emotions 
in  individual  scenes: 

That  a  great  mastery  in  the  representation  of  characters  is 
ascribed  to  Shakespeare  proceeds  from  the  fact  that  Shake- 
speare really  has  a  pecuHarity  that  on  superficial  observation, 
taken  in  connection  with  the  play  of  good  actors,  may  appear 
an  ability  to  represent  characters.  This  peculiarity  consists  in 
the  ability  to  conduct  scenes  in  which  the  movement  of  feelings 
is  expressed.  However  umiatural  are  the  positions  in  which  he 
places  his  persons,  however  unsuited  to  them  is  the  language 
which  he  makes  them  speak,  however  characterless  they  are, 
the  very  movement  of  feeling,  the  increase  in  it,  the  change  of 
it,  the  combination  of  many  contradictory  feelings  are  often 
expressed  truly  and  strongly  in  some  scenes  of  Shakespeare. 
And  in  the  play  of  good  actors  this  arouses  at  least  for  a  cer- 
tain time  sympathy  with  the  persons  taking  part  in  them. 

Shakespeare,  himself  an  actor  and  a  clever  man,  knew  how 
to  represent,  not  only  by  speeches,  but  by  exclamations, 
gestures,  repetitions  of  words,  the  spiritual  states  and  the 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  S51 

changes  of  feeling  that  occur  in  the  persons  taking  part.  Thus 
in  many  places  the  persons  of  Shakespeare,  instead  of  using 
words,  merely  exclaim  or  weep,  or  in  the  midst  of  a  monologue 
often  show  by  gestures  the  sadness  of  their  condition  (thus  Lear 
asks  to  have  his  button  undone),  or  in  a  moment  of  strong 
agitation  ask  the  same  question  several  times  over  and  make 
persons  repeat  the  word  that  particularly  strikes  them,  as 
Othello,  Macduff,  Cleopatra,  and  others.  Such  clever  methods 
of  representing  the  movement  of  feelings,  by  giving  good  actors 
an  opportunity  to  show  their  strength,  have  often  been  mis- 
taken and  are  still  mistaken  by  many  critics  for  the  repre- 
sentation of  character.  But  however  strongly  the  movement 
of  feeling  may  be  represented  in  one  scene,  one  scene  cannot 
give  the  character  of  a  person,  when  that  person  after  a  truthful 
exclamation  or  gesture  begins  at  great  length,  not  in  his  own 
language,  but  according  to  the  caprice  of  the  author,  to  utter 
speeches  that  are  totally  useless  and  do  not  correspond  to  his 
character. — [On  Shakespearey  eh.  4.] 

Tolstoy  seems  further  to  admit  that  many  of  the 
speeches  and  aphorisms  in  Shakespeare,  though  not  deep 
or  original,  and  though  inappropriate  to  the  persons 
uttering  them,  are  in  themselves  impressive. 

In  all  this  Tolstoy  is  condemning  Shakespeare  be- 
cause he  is  not  a  realist  and  psychologist  of  Tolstoy's 
own  school,  because  he  is  a  romantic  writer  who  used 
technical  methods  which  were  popular  in  his  own  time, 
and  which,  if  general  experience  be  of  any  weight,  have 
not  lost  their  appeal  today.  Tolstoy  is  in  accord  with 
some  modern  critics  .who,  whether  we  agree  with  them 
or  not,  cannot  be  stigmatized  as  ignorant  and  superficial ; 


352  TOLSTOY 

who,  in  fact,  condemn  with  perfect  justice  the  effort  to 
discover  in  Shakespeare  all  the  technical  qualities  that 
we  prize  in  dramatists  of  our  own  time.*  Shakespeare 
often  neglected  consistency  of  character,  not  to  speak 
of  realistic  truth  of  diction,  in  his  search  for  poetic 
ornament  or  for  immediate  dramatic  effect.  Goethe, 
whom  Tolstoy  incorrectly  terms  the  founder  of  Shake- 
speare's present  fame,  makes  a  remark  that  is  exactly 
in  Tolstoy's  own  tone:  "He  regarded  his  plays  as  a 
lively  and  changing  scene  which  should  pass  rapidly 
before  eye  and  ear,  and  his  only  interest  was  to  be 
effective  and  significant  for  the  moment.^f 

Finally,  Tolstoy  denies  to  Shakespeare  sincerity,  a 
vivid  sympathy  by  the  author  with  that  which  he  repre- 
sents. "In  all  his  works  one  sees  calculated  artificiality; 
it  is  evident  that  he  is  not  *in  earnest,'  that  he  is  playing 
with  words"  (ch.  6).  Here,  despite  the  conceits  of 
Lovers  Labor's  Lost  and  Romeo  and  Juliet,  one  must 
definitely  part  company  with  Tolstoy.  This  is  a  personal 
opinion,  founded  partly  on  minor  defects  in  Shake- 
speare's style,  but  more  on  Tolstoy's  own  repugnance 
for  his  lack  of  the  religious  point  of  view. 

Tolstoy   further   repeats   the   old   denunciations   of 


*  One  may  cite,  for  example.  Professor  E.  E.  Stoll,  particularly  his 
Othello,  an  Historical  and  Comparative  Study  (Minneapolis,  Bulletin  of 
the  University  of  Minnesota,  1915).  From  a  thorough  study  of  Eliza- 
bethan dramatic  art  he  draws  conclusions  as  to  Shakespeare's  technical 
methods,  though  not  as  to  his  general  worth  as  a  poet  and  an  artist, 
strikingly  similar  to  those  of  Tolstoy.  Mr.  Shaw's  attacks  on  Shake- 
speare also  offer  parallels  to  Tolstoy. 

t  Conversations  with  Eekermann,  quoted  by  Stall,  Othello,  p.  57. 


LATER  ARTISTIC  WORKS;    "WHAT  IS  ART?"  353 

Shakespeare  for  his  anachronisms,  for  his  coarseness 
and  exaggeration,  and  for  the  conventionaHty  of  his  bor- 
rowed plots.  He  denies  that  these  demerits  of  Shake- 
speare were  due  merely  to  the  age  in  which  he  lived: 

However  far  Homer  may  be  from  us,  we  transfer  ourselves 
without  the  slightest  effort  into  the  life  that  he  describes.  And 
we  transfer  ourselves,  mainly,  because,  however  strange  to  us 
are  the  events  that  Homer  describes,  he  believes  in  what 
he  is  saying,  and  speaks  seriously  about  what  he  is  saying, 
and  therefore  never  exaggerates,  and  the  feeling  of  measure 
never  deserts  him.  Hence  it  comes  that,  not  to  speak  of  the 
marvelously  clear,  living,  and  beautiful  characters  of  Achilles, 
Hector,  Priam,  and  Odysseus,  and  the  forever  touching  scenes 
of  the  farewell  of  Hector,  the  embassy  of  Priam,  the  return  of 
Odysseus  and  others,  the  whole  Iliad,  and  still  more  the 
Odyssey,  kre  as  naturally  near  to  us  as  though  we  ourselves 
had  lived  and  were  living  amid  gods  and  heroes.  It  is  not  so 
with  Shakespeare.  From  his  very  first  words  one  sees  exag- 
geration: exaggeration  of  events,  exaggeration  of  feelings,  and 
exaggeration  of  expressions.  One  sees  at  once  that  he  does  not 
believe  in  what  he  is  saying,  that  he  does  not  care  for  it,  that 
he  is  thinking  up  the  events  that  he  is  describing,  and  is 
indifferent  to  his  own  persons;  that  he  has  devised  them 
only  for  the  stage,  and  therefore  makes  them  act  and  speak 
only  what  may  impress  his  public;  and  therefore  we  do  not 
believe  either  in  the  events,  or  in  the  acts  or  in  the  miseries  of 
his  characters.  Nothing  shows  so  clearly  the  complete  ab- 
sence of  esthetic  feeling  in  Shakespeare  as  the  comparison 
of  him  with  Homer.  The  works  that  we  call  the  works  of 
Homer  are  artistic,  poetic,  original  works  that  were  lived 
through  by  the  author  or  authors. 


354  TOLSTOY 

But  the  works  of  Shakespeare,  being  borrowed  compositions, 
thought  up  for  an  occasion,  glued  together  externally  and 
artificially,  out  of  little  pieces,  like  a  mosaic,  have  nothing  in 
common  with  art  and  poetry. — [On  Shakespeare,  ch.  5.] 

Here  speaks  the  apostle  of  simplicity  as  well  as  the 
master  of  modern  realism.  On  both  sides  of  his  genius, 
the  artistic  and  the  religious,  Tolstoy  was  tempera- 
mentally alien  to  Shakespeare.  His  essay  is  valuable 
as  a  stimulus  to  thought,  but  not  as  a  guide  to  a  just 
estimate  of  Shakespeare. 


CHAPTER  X 

CONCLUSION 

jARLY  in  the  morning  of  November  10,  1910, 
Tolstoy  left  his  home  forever,  accompanied 
by  his  friend  and  physician  Dr.  Makovitsky. 
His  departure  was  caused  by  his  gnawing 
dissatisfaction  with  the  conflict  between  his  faith  and 
surroundings,  and  in  particular  by  the  clash  of  his 
own  ideals  with  those  of  his  wife.  For  his  future  life  he 
apparently  had  no  definite  plan;  he  wished  merely  to 
get  away.    To  his  wife  he  wrote  a  last  message: 

My  departure  will  grieve  you.  I  am  sorry  for  this,  but  pray 
understand  and  believe  that  I  could  not  act  otherwise.  My 
position  in  the  house  is  becoming  unbearable.  I  can  no  longer 
live  amid  those  conditions  of  luxury  in  which  I  have  been  liv- 
ing; and  I  am  doing  what  old  men  of  my  age  usually  do.  They 
retire  from  the  life  of  the  world  in  order  to  live  in  solitude 
and  quiet  the  last  days  of  their  lives.  Please  understand  this 
and  do  not  follow  me  if  you  learn  where  I  am.  Your  coming 
will  not  change  my  resolution.  I  thank  you  for  your  honorable 
life  of  forty-eight  years  with  me,  and  I  beg  you  to  forgive  me 
for  all  the  wrong  that  I  may  have  done  you,  just  as  I  with 
my  whole  soul  pardou  you  for  whatever  wrong  you  may  have 

355 


$56  TOLSTOY 

done  me.  I  counsel  you  to  be  reconciled  to  the  new  position 
in  which  my  departure  places  you,  and  not  to  have  any  unkind 
feelings  for  me. — [Ksyunin:  The  Departure  of  Tolstoy,  pp. 
22,  23.] 

Tolstoy's  first  night  away  from  home  was  spent  at 
the  Optin  Monastery,  a  place  with  which  he  was  familiar 
from  his  previous  visits  there  (see  pages  285,  286);  on 
the  next  day  he  visited  his  sister  in  the  convent  at 
Shamordino,  where  he  was  joined  on  November  12  by  his 
daughter  Alexandra,  to  whom  he  had  confided  his  in- 
tention of  flight.  The  next  day  he  left  for  a  further 
journey,  with  his  daughter  and  Dr.  Makovitsky,  but  he 
was  taken  ill  on  the  train,  and  was  forced  to  stop  at 
Astapovo,  a  little  wayside  station,  where  the  kindly 
station-master  lodged  him  in  his  own  quarters.  Here 
he  was  soon  joined  by  Chertkov  and  other  friends  and 
by  various  members  of  his  family.  His  wife  came  at 
once  to  Astapovo,  but  respected  his  desire  not  to  see 
her;  she  did  not  enter  his  room  until  after  his  death. 
"If  she  comes  here,"  Tolstoy  told  Chertkov  with  tears, 
"I  shall  be  unable  to  refuse  her;  but  if  I  see  her,  it  will 
be  ruinous  for  me" — evidently  meaning  that  he  should 
not  have  the  strength  to  resist  her  plea  that  he  return 
to  the  old  home  surroundings.  The  sick  man's  strength 
rapidly  failed.  His  preoccupation  with  religious  ques- 
tions continued  to  the  last;  to  his  daughter  Alexandra  he 
dictated,  for  his  diary,  some  last  Thoughts  on  God. 
A  few  days  before  he  died  he  charged  his  daughter  Ta- 
tyana  to  think  of  all  humanity  rather  than  of  her  father 


CONCLUSION  357 

alone.  "I  have  but  one  bit  of  counsel  for  you,"  he  said, 
"  to  remember  that  in  this  world  there  are  many  men  be- 
sides Leo  Tolstoy;  but  you  look  at  none  but  Leo."*  He 
died  early  on  the  morning  of  November  20.  His  body 
was  taken  home,  and  was  buried,  according  to  his 
wishes,  without  religious  ceremonies  or  addresses,  on  the 
spot  in  his  estate  where  he  had  requested  that  it  should 
rest.  The  heartfelt  emotion  of  the  throng  assembled 
by  the  grave  and  their  singing  of  "Eternal  Memory" 
were  the  best  tributes  that  could  have  been  rendered 
to  the  departed  prophet. 

Tolstoy  has  been  given  a  place  in  this  series  of  volumes 
beside  Homer,  Virgil,  Dante,  Shakespeare,  Cervantes, 
Moli^re,  and  Goethe,  as  a  Master  Spirit  of  Literature. 
Whether  his  name  will  remain  permanently  associated 
with  that  great  company  it  is  impossible  to  be  sure.  But 
of  two  things  at  least  one  may  feel  perfectly  certain:  that 
he  is  the  master  spirit  among  all  writers  whom  Russia 
has  yet  produced,  and  that  he  is  the  master  spirit  among 
all  the  writers  of  the  world  since  the  time  of  Goethe. 

In  Russia  Tolstoy's  position  is  secure,  despite  voices 
that  nowadays  tend  to  depreciate  him  in  favor  of  the 
morbid  Dostoyevsky.  Such  eccentric  opinions  seem 
mere  whining  protests  against  the  almost  crushing 
fame  of  Tolstoy.  Moreover,  Tolstoy  is  not  only  the 
greatest  writer  of  Russia,  but  the  writer  most  typical  of 
Russian  society  as  it  had  shaped  itself  in  the  three 
*  Chertk6v:  The  Last  Days  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy,  pp.  li^-14. 


358  TOLSTOY 

hundred  years  between  the  estabHshment  of  serfdom  at 
the  end  of  the  sixteenth  century  and  the  beginnings  of 
the  industrial  and  pohtieal  revolution  in  our  own  time. 
Tolstoy  is,  to  borrow  a  phrase  that  Dostoyevsky  applied 
with  some  tinge  of  scorn  to  him  and  to  Turgenev,* 
a  writer  of  "landed-proprietor's  literature" — though  his 
scope  is  far  wider  than  the  term  at  first  suggests.  He 
draws  the  life  of  Russian  aristocrats  in  their  fields,  in 
their  country  manors,  in  their  city  homes,  in  the  army; 
he  draws  with  equal  insight  the  life  of  the  peasants 
on  whom  they  depended  for  their  support.  He  knew 
the  hidden  souls  of  both  aristocrat  and  peasant  as  well 
as  their  outer  lives.  He  is  the  embodiment  of  the 
^kindliness  and  the  loyalty,  the  emotional  honesty  of 
the  Russian  nature,  and  at  the  same  time  of  its  passionate 
individuality,  its  revolutionary  boldness.  With  the 
pride  of  the  aristocrat  he  united  the  moral  fervor  of  the 
peasant  sectarian.  Through  his  work  Russia  of  the 
nineteenth  century  received  lasting  artistic  expression  of 
its  external  forms  of  life  and  of  its  spiritual  yearnings. 

And  among  other  great  writers  of  our  time  what  man 
can  compare  with  Tolstoy  in  universal  fame.?  If  a 
Frenchman  exalts  Victor  Hugo  or  a  Pole  Sienkiewicz, 
the  world  feels  that  they  are  prompted  by  patriotic 
affection  rather  than  by  sober  reason.  Yet  we  are  per- 
haps so  close  to  Tolstoy,  so  much  under  the  immediate 
appeal  of  his  artistic  genius,  his  moral  fervor,  and  his 
brotherly  personality,  that  we  cannot  judge  with  perfect 
*  l^etter  to  Strakhov,  May  18  [30],  1871. 


CONCLUSION  359 

impartiality  whether  three  hundred  years  hence  he  will 
occupy  a  place  like  that  of  Shakespeare  or  Cervantes  in 
our  own  day. 

Certainly  if  realistic  fiction  retains  its  hold  upon  men's 
minds  Tolstoy's  glory  will  not  soon  fade  away.  For  his 
fiction  has  already  triumphed  over  place,  if  not  over 
time,  as  has  none  other  before  it.  Writing  in  a  language 
scarcely  known  outside  his  own  country,  he  has  created 
men  and  women  who  have  become  brothers  and  sisters 
to  all  humanity.  Residing  War  dhd  Peace  and  Anna 
Karemn,  we  forget  the  bounds  of  nationality  in  our 
sympathetic  understanding  of  the  human  beings  whose 
lives  we  share.  These  novels,  critics  tell  us,  are  lacking 
in  form;  "he  wanted  art,"  as  men  said  of  Shakespeare. 
But  the  genius  of  the  author  triumphed  over  his  neglect 
of  formal  rules,  which  are  at  best  but  general  statements 
of  literary  method,  useful  in  many  cases  but  not  binding 
on  a  man  who  can  gain  his  effects  without  them.  In 
Tolstoy  the  interpretation  of  our  daily  life  reached  new 
heights.  In  his  works  men  and  women  are  lovely  with- 
out ceasing  to  be  commonplace,  and  they  are  common- 
place without  ceasing  to  be  lovely.  They  are  lovely  be- 
cause their  creator,  to  use  his  own  beautiful  phrase, 
"saw  through  with  love"  (page  159).  His  art  had  none 
of  the  esthetic  aloofness  that  parts  an  artist  from  his  kind; 
it  was  an  art  that  made  the  proud  aristocrat  a  brother  to 
the  whole  world. 

Nor  does  mere  artistic  sympathy  exhaust  Tolstoy's 
power  as  a  student  of  character.    He  has  also  the  saeva 


S60  TOLSTOY 

indignatio,  the  burning  indignation  of  a  Swift.  The 
Kreutzer  Sonata^  The  Death  of  Ivan  Ilyich^  and  The 
Power  of  Darkness  will  ever  retain  a  place  in  the  Utera- 
ture  of  rebuke  and  scorn. 

When  we  turn  from  Tolstoy  the  master  of  realistic 
fiction  to  Tolstoy  the  moralist  and  the  preacher,  we 
are  on  ground  where  prophecy  may  be  more  hazardous. 
His  writings  on  ethical  and  social  questions  will  live,  we 
may  be  sure,  if  they  do  live,  not  as  a  rounded  pres- 
entation of  ultimate  truth,  but  as  the  revelation  of 
a  powerful  personality  and  of  a  unified  and  noble  view  of 
human  conduct.  Great  religious  classics  do  not  derive 
their  value  solely  from  the  ethical  truth  that  they  con- 
tain, but  from  the  fervor  with  which  they  present  cer- 
tain aspects  of  human  conduct,  and  from  the  artistic, 
poetic  form  in  which  they  may  be  clothed.  Bunyan's 
Grace  Abounding  has  become  a  classic  of  religious  auto- 
biography, read  by  men  who  have  no  sympathy  what- 
ever with  the  theory  of  salvation  on  which  it  is  based. 
So  Tolstoy's  Confession^  that  cry  of  a  soul  in  agony, 
that  voice  of  a  searcher  after  God,  with  its  concentrated, 
ardent  expression  of  human  experience,  may  outlast 
War  and  Peace  in  the  memory  of  mankind.  Plato's 
Republic  embodies  a  philosophy  in  which  few  men  now 
believe,  but  it  has  more  readers  and  is  perhaps  a  more 
potent  influence  than  Aristotle's  Ethics,  the  doctrine  of 
which  is  never  likely  to  be  superseded.  The  Imitation 
of  Christ  and  the  Meditations  of  Marcus  Aurelius  appeal 
to  men  who  are  not  likely  ever  to  become  monks  or 


CONCLUSION  861 

Stoics.  The  Christian  Gospels  have  never  lost  their 
inspiration  for  generations  of  men  who,  consciously  or 
unconsciously,  reject  them  as  a  guide  of  life.  So  My 
Religion  and  What  Shall  We  Do  Then?  may  continue 
to  have  readers  and  admirers,  may  continue  to  stimulate 
thought  in  men  for  whom  Tolstoy's  gospel  of  Christian 
anarchy,  founded  on  non-resistance  to  evil  by  violence, 
is  an  absurdity. 

An  objector  may  say  that  Tolstoy's  religious  works 
would  be  far  less  read  were  it  not  for  his  fame  as  a 
novelist.  In  this  charge,  owing  to  the  frailty  of  human 
nature,  which  loves  to  be  amused  rather  than  instructed 
or  made  to  think,  there  is  some  truth,  but  truth  that  is 
of  small  importance.  It  is  more  important  to  remember 
that  Tolstoy's  artistic  genius  filled  with  life  his  religious 
works,  lending  force  to  doctrine  that  otherwise  expressed 
might  seem  either  "staled  by  frequence,  shrunk  by 
usage,"  or  else  so  extravagant  as  to  be  merely  curious. 
And  on  the  other  hand  his  novels  owe  their  greatness 
in  no  small  degree  to  the  moral  insight  and  the  moral 
fervor  of  their  author.  Tolstoy's  work,  changing  in  its 
form  and  complex  in  its  subject  matter,  is  animated  by 
one  rich  and  varied  personality. 

In  a  famous  passage  at  the  close  of  his  essay  on  Shake- 
speare Emerson  laments  the  failure  of  the  great  poet  of 
England  to  draw  from  his  marvelous  insight  into  the 
world  of  men  and  from  his  appreciation  of  its  beauty, 
some  measure  of  wisdom  for  the  guidance  of  his  own 
conduct:     "It  must  even  go  into  the  world's  history 


362  TOLSTOY 

that  the  best  poet  led  an  obscure  and  profane  life,  using 
his  genius  for  the  pubhc  amusement."  Even  so,  we 
may  add,  the  great  poet  of  Germany,  though  he  shaped 
his  conduct  by  a  conscious  philosophy,  led  a  life  that 
was  anything  but  inspiring  from  a  moral  point  of  view; 
Goethe's  marvelous  self-cultivation,  concentrated  on  the 
development  of  his  own  powers  and  on  his  own  enjoy- 
ment, was  selfish  and  in  a  sense  narrow.  Yet  in  the 
next  breath  Emerson  denounces  the  opposite  failure 
of  "priest  and  prophet,  Israelite,  German,  and  Swede," 
who  "beheld  the  same  objects"  and  "also  saw  through 
them  that  which  was  contained.  And  to  what  pur- 
pose.^ The  beauty  straightway  vanished;  they  read 
commandments,  all-excluding  mountainous  duty;  an 
obligation,  a  sadness,  as  of  piled  mountains,  fell  on 
them,  and  life  became  ghastly,  joyless,  a  pilgrim's 
progress,  .  .  .  and  the  heart  of  the  seer  and  the  heart 
of  the  listener  sank  in  them."  "It  must  be  conceded 
that  these  are  half-views  of  half-men,"  Emerson  con- 
cludes— "the  world  still  wants  its  poet-priest,  a  reconciler, 
who  shall  not  trifle  with  Shakespeare  the  player,  nor  shall 
grope  in  graves  with  Swedenborg  the  mourner;  but 
who  shall  see,  speak,  and  act,  with  equal  inspiration. 
For  knowledge  will  brighten  the  sunshine;  right  is  more 
beautiful  than  private  affection;  and  love  is  compatible 
with  universal  wisdom." 

Perhaps  Tolstoy  has  done  more  than  any  other 
writer  to  unite  these  two  views  of  life,  the  esthetic  and 
the  moralistic,  although  even  he  was  far  from  blending 


CONCLUSION  863 

them  in  perfect  harmony.  The  "great  writer  of  the 
Russian  land"  was  an  interpreter  of  conduct  as  well  as 
a  portrayer  of  it;  he  saw  the  comedy  and  the  tragedy  of 
human  life  with  a  marvelous  impartiality  approaching 
that  of  Shakespeare,  but  he  drew  them  as  an  earnest 
actor  in  them,  not  as  a  spectator  or  a  showman.  Unlike 
both  Shakespeare  and  Goethe,  he  became  a  servant  of  his 
fellow  men,  filled  with  a  spirit  of  Christian  love.  To  the 
spirit  of  Shakespeare  he  added  that  of  Milton  and 
of  Bunyan,  endeavoring  to  "justify  the  ways  of  God  to 
man."  He  showed  all  men  Russia  as  it  was  in  his  own 
time,  he  made  clear  to  all  men  the  spiritual  realities 
that  lay  hidden  behind  the  passing  show  mirrored  in  his 
writings,  and  he  strove  to  shape  his  own  life  in  accord 
with  those  realities. 

And  finally,  the  personality  of  Tolstoy  may  remain 
significant,  independently  of  the  work  that  he  achieved. 
The  writings  of  some  great  authors  ai'e  finer  than  the 
lives  of  the  men  who  produced  them:  so  it  is  with 
Shakespeare,  with  Moliere,  with  Goethe,  with  Rous- 
seau. On  the  other  hand  one  feels  that  Dante  was  a 
personality  even  more  powerful  than  his  writings, 
though  unluckily  we  know  almost  nothing  of  his  daily 
life.  But  of  Tolstoy,  as  of  Milton,  we  know  everything; 
and  with  him,  as  with  Milton,  the  human  personality 
is  of  even  more  inspiration  than  the  Hterary  genius. 
Tolstoy  was  the  great  type  of  the  prophet  in  an  age 
that  was  materialistic  and  occupied  with  worldly 
prosperity.     His  shortcomings  and  failures,  one  must 


864  TOLSTOY 

admit,  were  pathetic;  his  compromises  with  his  doc- 
trine, a  doctrine  that  was  itself  the  antithesis  of  com- 
promise, at  times  verged  on  the  ludicrous.  Yet,  when 
all  this  is  granted,  he  still  differs  from  most  modern 
religious  teachers  in  being  more  eager  to  adapt  his  life 
to  his  message  than  are  they;  his  imperfect  strivings 
are  nobler-  than  their  acquiescence  in  social  conventions. 
Tolstoy  was  of  the  stuff  of  which  heroes  are  made.  Had 
he  not  lived  in  an  age  when  the  burning  of  heretics 
(though  unfortunately  not  of  all  our  fellow  men)  has 
passed  out  of  fashion,  he  would  have  died  at  the  stake. 
Under  real  persecution  he  would  have  been  the  most 
constant  of  martyrs.  To  the  day  of  his  death  he  was 
ever  searching  for  new  truth.  He  realized  his  own  ideal 
of  the  man  seeking  and  striving  for  righteousness. 

And  the  ideal  of  righteousness  that  Tolstoy  sought  and 
found  was  that  of  a  little  child.  When  he  himself  was 
over  seventy  he  wrote  thus  of  his  brother  Nikolay,  who 
was  six  years  older  than  himself: 

He  was  a  marvelous  boy  and  later  a  marvelous  man.  .  .  . 
He  it  was  who,  when  I  was  five,  Mitenka  six,  and  Serezha 
seven  years  old,  announced  to  us  that  he  had  a  secret  through 
winch,  when  it  should  be  disclosed,  all  men  should  be  made 
happy,  there  should  be  no  disease  and  no  disagreements;  no 
one  should  be  angry  with  any  one,  and  all  people  should  love 
one  another,  all  should  become  ant  (muraveynyye)  brothers — 
probably  these  were  the  Moravian  Brethren,  of  whom  he  had 
heard  or  read,  but  in  our  language  they  were  the  ant  brotliers. 
And  I  remember  that  the  term  ant  brothers  was  specially 


CONCLUSION  365 

pleasing  to  me,  reminding  me  of  ants  in  a  hill.  We  even  devised 
a  game  of  ant  brothers,  which  consisted  in  seating  ourselves 
under  chairs,  which  we  fenced  about  with  boxes  and  hung  with 
handkerchiefs,  and  in  sitting  there  in  the  dark,  snuggling  close 
to  one  another.  I  remember  that  I  then  experienced  a  peculiar 
feeling  of  love  and  tenderness  and  was  very  fond  of  this  game. 

The  ant  brothers  were  revealed  to  us,  but  the  main  secret, 
how  to  cause  all  men  to  be  free  from  any  misfortune,  never  to 
quarrel  or  be  angry,  and  to  be  continually  happy — this  secret, 
as  he  told  us,  he  had  written  on  a  green  stick;  and  he  had 
buried  this  stick  by  the  road,  on  the  edge  of  a  certain  ravine 
on  our  estate,  at  the  spot  where,  since  my  body  must  be 
buried  somewhere,  I  have  asked  to  be  interred  in  memory  of 
Nik61enka.  .  .  . 

The  ideal  of  ant  brothers,  cleaving  lovingly  to  one  another, 
only  not  under  two  armchairs  hung  with  handkerchiefs,  but  of 
all  men  of  the  world  under  the  whole  vault  of  heaven,  has  re- 
mained the  same  for  me.  And  as  I  then  believed  that  there 
existed  a  green  stick  on  which  was  written  what  should  destroy 
all  evil  in  men  and  give  them  a  great  blessing,  so  I  believe 
even  now  that  this  truth  exists  and  that  it  will  be  disclosed 
to  men  and  will  give  them  what  it  promises. — [Biryukov:  I, 
84-87,  quoting  from  Tolstoy's  manuscript  reminiscences  of  his 
childhood.] 

Tolstoy  lies  at  rest  in  the  spot  where  he  had  believed 
the  green  stick  was  buried  that  should  cause  all  men  to 
cease  from  quarreling  and  from  anger,  and  should  give 
them  continued  happiness. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The  first  three  of  the  following  lists  include  such  English  works  as 
seem  most  useful  for  students  of  Tolstoy.  A  few  books  in  French  are 
added.  The  fourth  list  is  of  various  books  in  Russian  that  have  been 
used  in  the  preparation  of  the  present  volume. 

1.  Translations 

Wiener. — Tlie  Complete  WorJcs  of  Count  Tolstoy.  Translated  from  the 
original  Russian  and  edited  by  Leo  Wiener.  24  vols.  Boston, 
Estes,  1904-5.  [This  set  includes  practically  all  of  Tolstoy's 
writings  through  the  year  1902.  Volumes  may  be  obtained 
separately.  It  is  the  most  complete  translation  in  English,  and 
is  very  accurate,  but  its  literary  style  is  sometimes  not  all  that 
could  be  desired.  It  is  invaluable  for  any  careful  study  of  Tolstoy. 
The  translator's  indexes,  chronological  table,  bibliography,  and 
account  of  the  life  and  writings  of  Tolstoy  add  greatly  to  its  use- 
fulness.] 

Garnett. — Anna  Karenin,  translated  from  the  Russian  by  Constance 
Gamett.  London,  Heinemann,  1911. — War  and  Peace.  Ibid., 
1911.  [For  general  use  these  are  the  most  satisfactory  translations 
of  Tolstoy's  two  chief  novels.] — The  Death  of  Ivan  Ilyich  and 
Other  Stories.  Ibid.,  1915. — The  Kingdom  of  God  Is  Within  You. 
Ibid.,  1894. 

Maude,  Aylmer. — Hadji  Murad,  translated  by  Aylmer  Maude. 
New  York,  Dodd,  19U— What  is  Art?   New  York,  Crowell,  1899. 

Maude,  Louise. — Resurrection,  translated  by  Mrs.  Louise  Maude. 
New  York,  Dodd,  1900. 

Maude,  Louise  and  Aylmer. — The  Cossacks  and  Other  Tales  of  the 
Caucasus,   translated  by  Louise  and  Aylmer  Maude.     Oxford 
University   Press,    1917. — Plays:    The   Power  of  Darkness,    The 
367 


368  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

First  Distiller,  Fruits  of  Culture.    New  York,  Funk,  1904. — Sevas- 
topol and  Other  Military  Tales.    Ibid.,  1903. 

Hapgood. — Childhoody  Boyhood,  Youth,  translated  from  the  Russian 
by  Isabel  F.  Hapgood.    New  York,  Crowell,  1911. 

Chertk:6v  [Tchertkoff]. — Tolstoy  on  Shakespeare,  translated  by  V. 
Tchertkojff  and  I.  F.  M.    New  York,  Funk,  1906. 

Wright  (editor). — Father  Sergius  and  Other  Stories,  edited  by  Dr. 
Hagberg  Wright.  New  York,  Dodd,  1912.— T/ie  Forged  Coupon 
and  Other  Stories.  Ibid.,  1912. — The  Light  that  Shines  in  Darkness. 
Ibid.,  1912.— r^e  Man  Who  Was  Dead;  The  Cause  of  It  All. 
Ibid.,  1912. 

My  Confession;  My  Religion;  The  Gospel  in  Brief.    New  York, 


Crowell,  1911. 

Hogarth  and  Sirnis. — The  Diaries  of  Leo  ToZstoi/.  translated  from  the 
Russian  by  C.  J.  Hogarth  and  A.  Sirnis.  [Vol.  I.]  Youth,  18j^7  to 
1852.  New  York,  Dutton,  1917.  [This  was  received  when  the 
present  work  was  already  in  type — too  late  to  be  of  ervice.  The 
writer  has  been  unable  to  consult  the  Russian  text  of  this  work.] 

Strunsky. — The  Journal  of  Leo  Tolstoi  (first  volume — 1895-1899), 
translated  from  the  Russian  by  Rose  Strunsky.  New  York, 
Knopf,  1917.  [The  writer  has  been  unable  to  consult  the  Rus- 
sian text  of  this  work.] 

BiENSTOCK. — LSon  Tolstoi:  Correspondance  inSdite,  rSunie,  annoiSe  et 
traduite  par  J.  W.  Bienstock.    Paris,  Charpentier,  1907. 

Cheap  editions  of  What  I  Believe  (" My  Religion"),  What  Shall  We  Do  9, 
On  Life,  The  Kingdom  of  God  Is  Within  You,  and  others  of  Tolstoy's 
religious  writings  have  been  issued  by  the  Free  Age  Press,  London. 

2.      BlOGRAPHT 

Pavel  Biryukov  [Paul  Birukoff]:  Lev  Nikoldyevich  Tolstoy,  a 
Biography.  [In  Russian],  2  vols.  Moscow,  1906-8;  ed.  2,  1911-13. 
[This  is  the  authority  on  Tolstoy's  life  up  to  1884;  it  has  not  been 
completed.  Though  invaluable  as  a  collection  of  materials,  it 
is  poorly  digested  and  ill  written.  References  in  this  volume  are 
to  the  first  Russian  edition;  reference  is  made  to  Biryukov  even 
when  his  sources  were  accessible  to  the  writer  and  used  by  him. — 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  369 

The  first  volume  has  appeared  in  an  English  translation:  Leo 
Tolstoy,  his  Life  and  Work;  New  York,  Scribner,  1906.  Both  vol- 
umes are  accessible  in  French:  Leon  Tolstoi;  vie  et  CBUvre,  mS- 
moires;  Paris,  Mercure  de  France,  1906-9.] 

The  Life  of  Tolstoy,  translated  from  the  Russian.    ]New  York, 


Cassell,  1911.  [Not  to  be  confused  with  the  preceding.  A  short 
sketch  of  Tolstoy's  life,  mainly  from  the  point  of  view  of  his 
religious  teaching.  The  writer  has  been  unable  to  consult  the 
Russian  text  of  this  work.] 

AyuviebMaude:  The  Life  of  Tolstoy.  2  vols.  New  York,  Dodd,  1910. 
[This  is  the  best  English  work  on  Tolstoy's  life.  The  first  volume 
is  mainly  a  rehandling  of  Biryukov's  materials;  the  second  is  to 
a  considerable  degree  based  on  personal  reminiscences  of  Tolstoy. 
Cited  in  foot-notes  as  Maude.] 

Nathan  Haskell  Dole:  The  Life  of  Count  Lyof  N.  TolsUri.  New 
York,  Crowell,  1911,  [This  gives  the  facts  as  to  Tolstoy's  life  in 
shorter  compass  than  the  work  of  Maude.] 

Count  IlyX  Tolstoy:  Reminiscences  of  Tolstoy,  by  his  son.  Count 
Ilyd  Tolstoy;  translated  by  George  Calderon.  New  York,  Cen- 
tury, 1914.  [The  writer  has  been  unable  to  consult  the  Russian 
text  of  this  work.] 

S.  A.  Behrs:  Reminiscences  of  Count  L.  N.  Tolstoy.  [In  Russian], 
Smolensk,  1893.  [Behrs  was  the  brother  of  the  Countess  Tolstoy. 
There  is  an  English  translation  by  Charles  Edward  Turner,  Recol- 
lections of  Count  Leo  Tolstoy:  London,  Heinemann,  1893.] 

P.  Sergeyenko  [Sergyeenko]:  How  Count  L.  N.  Tolstoy  Lives  and 
Works.  [In  Russian.]  Moscow,  1898.  [Accessible  in  an  English 
translation  by  Isabel  F.  Hapgood:  New  York,  Crowell,  1899.] 

Accounts  of  Tolstoy's  work  during  the  famine  of  1891-93  are  given 
in  In  the  Land  of  Tolstoi,  by  Jonas  Stadling  and  Will  Reason  (London, 
Clarke,  1897),  and  in  In  the  Track  of  the  Russian  Famine,  by  E.  A, 
Brayley  Hodgetts  (London,  Unwin,  1892). 

Accounts  of  the  Dukhobors  and  of  Tolstoy's  connection  with  them 
are  given  in  A  Peculiar  People,  the  Doukhohors,  by  Aylmer  Maude 
(New  York,  Funk,  1904),  and  Tlie  Doukhohors,  by  Joseph  Elkinton 
(Philadelphia,  Ferris,  1903). 


370  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

3.    Cetticism 

-•^RoMAiN  Rolland:  Vic  de  Tolsim.  Paris,  Hachette,  1911.  [A  won- 
derfully sympathetic,  penetrating,  and  many-sided  appreciation 
of  Tolstoy  as  artist  and  thinker.  It  is  accessible  in  an  English 
translation  by  Bernard  Miall:  New  York,  Dutton»  1911.] 

William  Dean  HowELLs:  My  Literary  Tassions.  New  York,  Harper, 
1895.    [The  last  chapter  is  a  fine  tribute  to  Tolstoy.] 

D.  S.  Merezhkovsky  [Merejkowski]:    L.  Tolstoy  and  Dosioyevshj; 

Life,  Work,  and  Religion.  [In  Russian.]  St.  Petersburg,  1912. 
(Vols,  vii-ix  of  Merezhkovsky 's  Works.)  [The  first  two  parts 
of  this  work  are  translated  under  the  title  Tolstoi  as  Man  and 
Artist,  with  an  Essay  on  Dostdievski:  New  York,  Putnam,  1902. 
The  work,  though  written  from  an  eccentric  point  of  view,  contains 
brilliant  criticism.] 

Aylmer  Maude:  Tolstoy  and  his  Problems.  Ed.  2.  London,  Grant 
Richards,  1902. 

OssiP-LouRi£:    La  Philosophie  de  Tolstoi.    Paris,  Alcan,  1899. 

General  accounts  of  Tolstoy's  work  may  of  course  be  foimd  in  all 
books  on  modern  Russian  literature.  Attention  may  be  called  to  the 
following: 

E.  M.  de  VoGUig:  Le  roman  russe.    Paris,  Plon,  1886.    [English  trans- 

lation by  Colonel  H.  A.  Sawyer:  The  Russian  Novel;  London, 
Chapman,  1913.] 

Ernest  Dupuy:  Les  grands  maiires  de  la  litter ature  russe  au  dix- 
neuvieme  siecle.  Paris,  Legene,  1885.  [English  translation  by 
Nathan  Haskell  Dole:  The  Great  Masters  of  Russian  Literature  in 
the  Nineteenth  Century;  New  York,  Crowell,  1886.] 

A.  BRtJcKNER:  A  Literary  History  of  Russia,  translated  [from  the 
German]  by  H.  Havelock.    New  York,  Scribner,  1908. 

P.  Kropotkin:  Russian  Literature.    New  York,  McCIure,  1905. 

William  Lyon  Phelps:  Essays  on  Russian  Novelists.  New  York, 
Macmillan,  1911. 

4.    Russian  Sources 

The  following  titles  are  translated  from  the  Russian. 
Letters  of  Count  L.  N.  Tolstoy  to  his  Wife,  1862-1910.     Edited  by  A.  E. 
Gruzinsky.    Moscow,  1913. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  371 

Correspondence  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy  with  the  Countess  A.  A.  Tolstoy,  1857- 
1903.  Published  by  the  Society  of  the  Tolstoy  Museum.  St. 
Petersburg,  1911. 

Tolstoy  Almanach.  Letters  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy,  18^8-1910.  Collected  and 
edited  by  P.  A.  Sergeyenko.    2  vols.    Moscow,  1910-11. 

A  New  Collection  of  Letters  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy.  Collected  by  P.  A.  Ser- 
geyenko, edited  by  A.  E.  Gruzinsky.    Moscow,  1912. 

Correspondence  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy  with  N.  N.  Strakhov.  Published  in  The 
Contemporary  World,  January  to  December,  1913. 

E.  Bogoslovsky:    Turgenev  on  Lev  Tolstoy.    Tiflis,  1894. 

V.  F.  Bulgakov:  With  L.  N.  Tolstoy  during  the  Last  Year  of  his  Life. 
Moscow,  1911. 

V.  Chertkov:    On  the  Last  Days  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy.    Moscow,  1911. 

M.  Dragomirov:  Sketches.  Kiev,  1898.  [Contains  a  critique  on 
Count  Tolstoy's  "War  and  Peace"  from  a  Military  Point  of  View.] 

N.  Kareyev:  The  Historical  Philosophy  of  Count  L.  N.  Tolstoy  in 
"War  and  Peace.'*  St.  Petersburg,  1888.  [Reprinted  from  The 
Messenger  of  Europe,  July,  1887.] 

A.  Ksyunin:    The  Departure  of  Tolstoy.    St.  Petersburg,  1911. 

Sergeyenko  (compiler) :  International  Tolstoy  Almanach:  On  Tolstoy. 
Moscow,  1909.    [A  collection  of  articles  by  various  writers.] 

I.  Teneromo  [Feinermann]:  Life  and  Discourses  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy. 
St.  Petersburg,  n.  d. 

Livifig  Words  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy.    Moscow,  1912. 


INDEX 

Note: — Specific  references  to  Tolstoy's  life,  personality,  literary  char- 
acteristics, and  teachings  are  grouped  under  the  heading  Tolstoy,  Count 
Leo  (Lev  Nikoldyevich);  but  references  to  his  individual  writings  will  be 
found  under  their  titles  {Anna  Karenin,  War  and  Peace,  etc.).  References 
to  characters  in  Tolstoy^ s  novels  are  gouped  under  that  heading. 

The  following  abbreviations  are  used: 

An.  Kar. — Anna  Karenin. 

C.  B.  Y. — Childhood,  Boyhood,  and  Youth. 

W.  and  P. — War  and  Peace. 


About,  157. 
Achilles,  184,  289,  353. 
Adam  Bede,  340,  341. 
adulterv,   155,   199,  201,  301, 

312,  317. 
<^neas,  185. 
iEsop,  116. 

Esthetics  (Veron),  327. 
Afanasyev,  115. 
Agesilaus,  31. 
agnosticism,  126. 
agnostics,  227. 
Aksakov,  25. 
Albert,  65. 
Alekseyev,   Vasily  Ivanovich, 

274. 
Alexander  the  Great,  31. 
Alexander  I,  161,  176,  177. 
Alexander  II,  38,  62,  84,  257. 
Alexander  III,  257,  295. 
Ambrose,  Father,  286. 


America,  14,  54,  57,  58,  106,  189, 

313. 
anarchism,  see  Tolstoy,  philosophy: 

social. 
Anatomy  of  Melancholy,  158. 
310,    And  the  Light  Shineth  in  Darkness, 
240,  266. 
Andreyev,  48. 

Anna  Karenin,  7,  8,  15,  18,  62,  85, 
115,  128,  132,  133,  135,  149, 
150,  151,  152,  158,  176,  189- 
201  217,  220,  246,  247,  262, 
304,  307,  321,  323,  359. 
a  great  love  story,  195. 
a  novel  of  the  conscience,  196. 
anecdote  of  beginning,  149-150. 
222,        basis  of  plot,  150. 

comparison    to    living    organism, 

194. 
conduct  the  theme,  196. 
dramatization  of,  308. 
motto  discussed,  199-201, 
mowing  scene,  196, 
373 


374 


INDEX 


plot  construction,  190-191. 
Puritan  point  of  view,  189,  197- 

201. 
sense  of  impending  tragedy  in,  191 . 
Tolstoy's  lack  of  enthusiasm  for, 

150. 
unity  and  concentration  of,  189- 

190. 
see  also,  under  characters  in  Tol- 
stoy's novels:  Karenin,  Kitty, 

Levin,  Vronsky. 
"ant  brothers,"  364-365. 
Antichrist,  Tolstoy  denounced  as, 

283. 
Antdn  Goremyka,  16. 
Antony,  Mark,  185. 
Anuchin,  300. 
Arbuzov,  286. 
aristocratic    traditions    of    Tolstoy 

family,  137. 
Aristotle,  92,  254,  360. 
Arnold,  Matthew,  347. 
art,  see  What  is  Art?,  Preface  to  the 

Works  of  Guy  de  Maupassant, 

and  On  Shakespeare  and  the 

Drama;   also  Tolstoy,  views 

on  esthetics. 
Artyukhov,  Madam,  80. 
asceticism,  see  Tolstoy,  philosophy: 

religious, 
assassination  of  Alexander  III,  257. 
Astapovo,  356. 
Auerbach,  73. 
Augustine,  92. 
"aunt"     Tatyana,     see    Ergolsky, 

Tatyana. 
Aurelius,  Marcus,  231,  360. 
Austerlitz,  175. 
authority,  traditional,  126. 
autocracy,  54,  55,  58,  126,  294. 

B 

Babylon,  200. 

ball,  Natasha's  first  {W.  and  P.), 

166-167. 
Barydtinsky,  Prince,  11. 
Bashkir  nomads,  141. 


Baumgarten,  330. 

bear-hunt,  70-71.  116. 

Beethoven,  119,  121,  154,  336,  340, 
342. 
Kreutzer  Sonata^  312. 

Begichevka,  282. 

Behrs,  Liza,  85. 

Behrs,  Sofya,  85. 
see  also  Tolstoy,  Countess  Sofya 
Andreyevna. 

Behrs,  Stepan,  131,  135,  141,  148, 
262. 
see  also  Reminiscences  (Behrs). 

Behrs,  Tatyana  (Tanya),  161-162. 

Belbek,  38. 

Bellows,  John,  321-322. 

Berlin,  72. 

Bethink  Yourselves,  299. 

Bibikov,  137,  150. 

Bible,  92,  116. 

Bibliotheque  de  mon  oncle,  36. 

Biryukov,  Pavel,  61,  88,  231,  287. 
Life  of  Tolstoy  (Russian),  10,  11, 
13,  14,  17,  20,  21,  22,  38,  46, 
47,  49.  59,  61,  62,  64,  68,  69, 
73,  76,  78,  79,  80,  81,  84,  85, 
86,  136,  139,  140,  141,  143, 
144,  149,  151,  154,  155,  156, 
157,  162,  195,  211,  240,  258, 
259,  267,  281,  302,  303,  304, 
365. 
Life  of  Tolstoy  (New  York,  1911), 
287. 

Bismarck,  3. 

Black  Beauty,  131. 

Bohemian  Brethren,  242. 

Bondarev,  251. 

book-keeping  methods  of  Tolstoy, 
285. 

Borodino,  169,  179,  186. 

Borrow,  172. 

boyars,  148,  149. 

Brahms,  338. 

Brussels,  72,  258. 

Brutus,  185. 

Bucharest,  38. 

Buddha,  211,  213,  231. 

Buddhism,  215,  254,  315,  317. 


INDEX 


375 


Buddhists,  316. 
Bulgaria,  151. 
Bulka  (bulldog),  116. 
bull  kills  herdsman,  144. 
Bulletin  of  the  Patients  at  Yasnaya 
Poly  ana  Lunatic  Asylum^  281. 
Bunyan,  349,  300,  363. 
Burns,  342. 
Byron,  50. 

C 

Caesar,  Julius,  31,  96. 
Canada,  290,  291. 
capital  punishment,  218. 
categorical  imperative,  253. 
Catherine  II,  Empress,  10,  89,  225. 
(v'atholicism,  55. 
(Catholics,  see  Roman  Catholics. 
Caucasus,  11,  16,  23,  38,  48,  49,  52, 

116,  236,  324,  325. 
Caxton,  248. 
celibacy,  311,  313,  315. 
censorship,  40,  57,   147,  226,  287, 

294,  302. 
Cervantes,  343,  357,  359. 
Channing,  231. 

CHARACTERS  IN  ToLSTOT's  NOVELS*. 

Agafya  Mikhaylovna  {An.  Kar.), 

193. 
Akim  {Power  of  Darkness),  310. 
An  drey.  Prince  {W.  and  P.),  see 

Bolkonsky. 
Anna  Karenin,  see  Karenin. 
Antonov,  Sub.-Lieut.  {Sevastopol)^ 

40. 
Beletsky  (Cossacks),  49. 
Betsey,  Princess  {An.  Kar.),  198, 

199,  201. 
Bezukhov,  Count  Pierre  {W.  and 

P.),  161,  168,  169,  171,  174, 

176,  184,  187,  188,  189,  196, 

205,  248.  ^ 
Bolkonsky,  Prince  Audrey  {W.  and 

P.),  161,  166,  167,  168,  169, 

173,  175,  184,  186,  187,  189, 

196,  205. 
Bolkonsky,  Princess  Marya   {W. 

and  P.),  162,  173,  174. 


Denlsov  {W.  and  P.),  164,  165. 
Dolly  {A7i.  Kar.),  196,  198. 
Eroshka,  Uncle  {Cossacks),  52. 
Galtsin,  Prince  {Sevastopol),  43, 44. 
Grisha  {C.  B.  Y.),  28,  29,  36,  240. 
Ilyich,  Ivan  (Death  of  Ivan  Ilyich), 

307,  308. 
Irtenyev,    Mikolay    (Nikolenka) 

(C.  B.  Y.),  25,  29,  30,  32,  35, 

205. 
Kalugin  (Sevastopol),  39,  45. 
Karatayev,  Platon  (W.  and  P.), 

184,  187,  188,  220. 
Karenin,  Anna,  190-203. 

husband's  ears,  192. 
last  glimpse  of,  202. 
T.'s  attitude  towards,  198. 
Karenin  (Anna's  husband),   191, 

192,  195,  198,  199,  200,  220. 
Katyusha  (Resurrection),  294, 319- 

321. 
Kitty  (An.  Kar.),  62, 128, 190, 191, 

196,  198,  220. 
Kozeltsov,  The  brothers   (Sevas- 
topol), 44. 
Koznyshev  (An.  Kar.),  198. 
Krugosvetlov,  Professor  (Fruits  of 

Enlightenment),  319. 
Kuragin,   Anatole   {W.  and  P.), 

168,  186,  220. 
Kuragin,  Princess  Elena  (W.  and 

P.),  174. 
Levin,  (An.  Kar.),  8,  86,  135,  176, 

185,  190,  191,  196,  198,  201, 
202,  203,  205,  217,  220,  248, 
347. 

Levin,  Nikolay   (An.  Kar.),    15, 

193. 
Lukashk  (Cossacks),  49,  52. 
Marya  (Father  Sergy),  317. 
Marya,  Princess  (W.  and  P.),  see 

Bolkonsky. 
Maryana  (Cossacks),  49,  50,  52. 
Mauer,  Karl  (C.  B.  Y.),  25,  32. 
Mikhaylov  (Sevastopol),  45. 
Mimi  (C.  B.  Y.),  25. 
Natalya  Savishna  (C.  B.  Y.),  25 

34,  35,  36. 


376 


INDEX 


Natasha  (W.  and  P.),  see  Rost6v. 
Nekhlyudov,  Dmitry  (C.  B.  F.), 

25. 
Nekhlyudov,  Prince  Dmitry  (Res- 
urrection), 319-320. 
Nikita  {Power  of  Darkness),  310- 

311. 
Nikolay  (Nik61enka)  (C.  B.  F.), 

see  Irtenyev. 
Oblonsky,  Stepan  (Stiva)  Arkddy- 

evitch  (An.  Kar.),  196,  197, 

198,  201,  350. 
Olenin  (Cossacks),  49,  50,  51,  52, 

205,  248. 
Pest  (Sevastopol),  45. 
Petrushov,    Ensign    (Sevastopol), 

40. 
Pierre  (W.  and  P.),  see  Bezukhov. 
Pozdnyshev     (Kreutzer     Sonata), 

312-313. 
Praskukhin  (Sevastopol),  45. 
Rostov,    Natasha    (W.   and   P.), 

143,  161,  162,  163,  164,  165, 

167,  168,  169,  170,  171,  172, 

173,?  186,  187,  188,  306. 
her  first  call,  166-167. 
her  first  proposal,  163-165. 
married  life,  169-170. 
old  age,  171-172. 
Rostov,    Nikolay    (W.    and   P.), 

8,   161,   172,   173,   175,   176, 

186,  347. 
Rostov,       Count       (father       of 

Natasha),  5,  161. 
St.  Jerome  (C.  B.  Y.),  25. 
Saryntsov  (Light  Shineth  in  Dark- 
ness), 240. 
Sergy,  Father,  317. 
Shamil  (Hadji  Murad),  324. 
Sonya  (W.  and  P.),  139,  162,  166, 

173. 
Stepan  Arkady evich  (An.  Kar.), 

see  Oblonsky. 
Sviyazhsky  (An.  Kar.),  198. 
Tanya  (Fruits  of  Enlightenment)  i 

319.  ;' 

Tushin,  Captain  (W.  and  P.),  175. 
Varenka  (An.  Kar.),  193. 


Vronsky  (An.  Kar.),  62,  190,  191, 
192,  193,  194,  195,  198,  199, 
200,  220. 
Tolstoy's    account    of   his    at- 
tempt at  suicide,  194-195. 
Vronsky,    Countess    (An.    Kar.), 

199. 
Zvezdintsev    (Fruits    of   Enlight- 
enment), 319. 

Chartreuse  de  Parme,  47. 

chastity,  311,  313,  315. 

Chaucer,  343. 

Chaykovsky,   153. 

Chelcicky,  330. 

Chernigov,  princess  of,  5. 
Governor  of,  289. 

Chernyshevsky,  59. 

Chertkov,  Vladimir,  48,  123,  226, 
287,  316,  356,  357. 

Childhood,  Boyhood,   and   Youth,  7, 
18,  23,  24-37,  40,  44,  47,  61, 
66,  174,  240,  300,  306,  319. 
T.'s  own  criticism  of,  36. 

"children's  shelters,"  283. 

Chimes,  340. 

china  dolls,  342. 

Chopin,  336. 

Christ,  see  Tolstoy,  philosophy: 
religious. 

Christian  anarchy,  124,  274,  361. 

Christianity,  215,  231,  241,  246, 
254,  297,  315,  317,  329,  330. 

Christianity  and  Patriotism,  299. 

Christians,  Free,  289. 

Christmas  festival,  136. 

church  and  state,  245,  246,  319. 

Churchill,  58. 

Circassians,  49,  50,  52. 

Civil  War  (U.  S.),  6. 

civilization,  see  Tolstoy,  philosophy: 
religious. 

Coleridge,  297. 

comedies,  131,  306,  308,  318. 

Comenius,  124. 

common  people,  inborn  excellence 
of,  36,  43,  56,  96,  104,  119, 
121,  187-188,  214,  215,  219- 
220,  242,  307,  335-336. 


INDEX 


377 


common  soldiers,  43-44,  45,  175. 
^  communal  life,  289. 

compulsion,    critique    of    Tolstoy's 
V^        attitude  on,  123. 
Confession,  see  My  Confession. 
Confession     of     Faith,     Tolstoy's, 

296-298. 
Confessions  (Rousseau),  16,  18. 
Confucius,  231. 
Congreve,  185. 
Conquest  of  Mexico,  17. 
Constantine,  241. 
Constantinople,  56. 
Contemporary,  24,  57-59,  61,  72,  74. 
Conversations  vyith  Eckermann,  352. 
copyright,  262,  287,  290. 
Corinthians,  311. 
Correspondance  inedite,  301. 
Cossack  girl,  Tolstoy's  love  of,  48, 

49,  61. 
Cossacks,  49,  290. 
Cossacks,  12,  49-53,  134,  246. 
Count  Leo  Tolstoy  Twenty  Years  Ago, 

159. 
Count  of  Monte  Cristo,  see  Monte 

Cristo. 
Course  of  Reading,  237,  300. 
courts  of  law,  136,145-147,  239,  321. 
Cowley,  343. 

creed,  Tolstoy's,  296-298. 
Crimea,  38. 
Crimean  War,  38,  54. 
Critique  of  Dogmatic  Theology,  220, 

222,  223-226,  227,  331,  332. 
critique  of  modem  art,  see  What  is 

Art? 
"cry-baby  Leo,"  20. 


Dante,  343,  357,  363. 
Danube  principalities,  38. 
Daphnis  and  Chloe,  342. 
David  Copperjield,  16,  20,  25,  340. 
Dead  House,  see  Hou^e  of  the  Dead. 
Dead  Soids,  16,  58,  159. 
-^  Death  of  Ivan  Ilyvitch,  248,  262,  305, 
307-308,  360. 


Decadents,  French,  336. 

Decembrists,  131,  151,  171-172. 

Departure  of  Tolstoy,  226,  356. 

Devil,  306,  317. 

Dewey,  Professor,  122. 

Diary,   12,  22,  46,  48,  61,  63,  68, 

81,  85,  86,  227,  231,  236,  258, 

259,  267,  288,  314,  315,  317, 

318,  356. 
Dickens,  16,  21,  190,  336,  339. 
Dictionary  of  Music,  17. 
disciples,  see  Tolstoyans. 
dissenters,  218,  220,  226. 

see  also  sectarians. 
Doges'  Palace,  334. 
doggerel  verses,  22,  38. 
Dolgoruky,  280. 
Don  Quixote,  184. 
Don  Quixote,  340. 
Donne,  343. 
Dostoyevsky,  3,  75,  159,  209,  323, 

340,  357,  358. 
Dovm  Mother  Volga,  119. 
Dragomirov,  General,  179. 
drama,   Tolstoy's  interest  in,    131, 

308-310,  318,  323,  348-354. 
Dresden,  72. 
Druzhinin,  72. 

Dukhobors,  242,  289,  290,  291,  321. 
Dumas,  Alexander,  176,  324. 
Durward,  Quentin,  184. 


E 


Ecclesiastes,  211. 

education,  aristocratic  English  view 

of,  104. 
education,  Tolstoy's  interest  in,  87. 

see  also  Tolstoy,  views  on. 
Education  and  Culture,  9,   90,   93, 

102,  104. 
education  in  France,  72,  95-97. 
education  in  Germany,  72,  91,  95. 
educational  problems,  see  Tolstoy, 

views  on  education. 
Eliot,  George,  205. 
emancipation  movement,  54,  56,  59, 

77-81,  126,  293. 


378 


INDEX 


Emerson,  231,  275,  300,  349,  361- 
362. 

Emile,  16,  18,  31,  124,  129. 

England,  54,  55,  57,  106,  146,  147, 
189,  226,  285,  287,  318, 
361. 

Enough,  Tolstoy's  estimate  of,  304. 

Epictetus,  231. 

Epicureanism,  212. 

Epicureans,  214. 

Epilogue  to  the  Kreutzer  Sonata, 
313,  314. 

Ergolsky,  Tatyana,  5,  15,  69,  86, 
138,  139,  149,  162,  199. 

Esarhaddon,  305. 

eschatalogical  expectation,  244. 

esthetics,  see  What  is  Art?  and  Tol- 
stoy, views  on  esthetics. 

"  Eternal  Memory,"  357. 

ethical  teachings,  see  Tolstoy, 
philosophy:  religious. 

Ethics  (Aristotle),  360. 

eudtemonists,  253,  254. 

Eugene  Onegin,  16,  57. 

Eunuchs,  sect  of,  316. 

"excommunication"  of  Tolstoy,  226, 
295. 

execution,  effect  of  seeing,  on  Tol- 
stoy, 63,  73. 


faith,  sce^  Tolstoy,  philosophy:  re- 
ligious. 

Falstaff,  350. 

fame  of  Tolstoy,  3-4,  48,  87,  144, 
163,  357-359. 

Family  Chronicle,  25. 

Family  Happiness,  62-63,  134. 

family  life,  Tolstoy's  denunciation 
of,  311. 
hut  see  also  (under  Tolstoy;  tem- 
perament) love  of  family  life. 

famine  relief  work,    106,    142-143, 
282-285,  287,  298. 

Faresov,  288. 

Father  Ambrose,  286. 

Father  8ergy,  280,  306.  317. 


Feinermann,  262,  263,  284,  289,  309, 

311. 
see  also  Teneromo. 
Fet,  22,  71,  72,  73,  75,  76,  130,  140, 

141,  143,  150,  152,  154,  155, 

156,  157,  211,  287. 
Fielding,  198. 
folk  songs,  342. 
folk  tales,  342,  344. 
footman,  story  of,  see  Forna. 
Foma,  280-281. 
Fourth  Bastion,  38. 
Fragment,  149. 
France,  73,  90,  95. 
France,  Anatole,  342. 
Francis  of  Assisi,  330. 
Frankfort,  73. 
fraternizing,  45. 

Free  Christians,  Society  of,  289. 
Free  Masons,  187. 
French  bourgeoisie,  307. 
French  Naturalists,  183. 
French  Revolution,  151. 
French    schools,    see    education    in 

France. 
Froebel,  122. 
Fruits  of  Enlightenment,  306, 318-319. 


Garshin,  48. 

George,  Henry,  292,  293,  300,  324. 

German  Kultur,  125. 

German   schools,   see  education   in 

Germany. 
Germany,  90,  95,  211,  226,  285,  310, 

362. 
God  Sees  the  Truth,  116,  305,  344. 
Goethe,  127,  163,  308,  336,  352,  357, 

362  363. 
Gogol,  16,' 21,  58,  75,  115,  159,  208. 
Goncharov,  57. 
G6ngora,  343. 
Gorky,  3. 
Gospels,  17,  68,  140,  219,  227-232, 

237,  241,  242,  245,  246,  251, 

286,  288,  296,  361. 
Fourth  Gospel,  229. 


INDEX 


379 


Gospel  of  Luke,  269. 

Gospel  of  Matthew,  16,  224,  237, 

241,  297. 
government,   see  Tolstoy,   attitude 

towards. 
Grace  Abounding,  360. 
Graham,  Stephen,  34. 
"great  writer  of  the  Russian  land," 

303,  304,  363. 
Greece,  211. 
Greek  language,  see  Tolstoy,  Greek 

studies. 
Greeks,  328,  330. 
"green  stick,"  365. 
Grigorovich,  16,  57. 
Grigoryev,  Mark,  80. 
Gromeka,  71. 
guillotine,  64. 
Gypsies,  22. 

H 

Hadji  Murad,  306,  323-325. 

Hal,  Prince,  184. 

Hannibal,  31. 

Hardy,  247. 

Harmony    and    Translation    of   the 

Four  Gospels,   222,  227-232, 

233,  238,  240,  248,  249. 
Hawthorne,  201. 
Haydn,  70. 
Hector,  353. 
hedonists,  253,  254. 
Helen  of  Troy,  163. 
Henry  IV,  95,  96. 
Henry,  O.,  58. 
herdsman  killed  by  bull,  144. 
heretic,  Tolstoy  considered,  295. 
hermit.  Orthodox,  141. 
Hero  of  our  Time,  16. 
Herodotus,  141. 
Herrick,  Robert,  58,  204. 
Herzen,  73,  83,  84. 
history,  modem  conception  of,  180, 

181,  183. 
history,    Tolstoy's    philosophy    of, 

131,  161,  175-184,  245. 
(for  detailed  references  see  War 

and  Peace.) 


History  of  Modern  Russian  Litera- 
ture, 152. 
Holstomer,  see  Linen-Measurer. 
Holy  Synod: 

"excommunicates"  Tolstoy,  295. 

Tolstoy's  reply  to,  296-298. 
Homer,  47,  68,  140,  177.  332,  353, 

357. 
Homyakov,  68. 
horse,  story  of,  130. 
House  of  the  Dead,  159,  340. 
How  Count  Tolstoy  Lives  and  Works, 

345. 
How  the  Other  Half  Lives,  269. 
Howells,   193. 
Hugo,  336,  339,  358. 
Hungary,  288. 
Hyeres,  73. 

I 

Ibsen,  127,  338. 
idle  rich,  219,  272,  334,  336. 
Idyl,  37. 

Iliad,  68,  341,  353. 
Imitation  of  Christ,  360. 
Incursion,  48. 
India,  211. 

individual  liberty,  125. 
individualism,   see  Tolstoy,   philos- 
ophy. 
Inspector-General,  58. 
international  relations,  298. 
Isaiah,  268. 
Islenev,  Miss,  85. 
Istomin,  280. 
Ivanhoe,  176,  345. 


Jena,  107. 

Jerusalem,  brand  of,  112. 

John  Bellows:  Letters  and  Memoir, 

323. 
John  the  Baptist,  269. 
John  the  Evangelist,  252. 
Joseph,  344-345. 
Joseph  and  his  Brethren,  117,  340, 

341,  342. 


INDEX 


Journal,  see  Diary. 

jural  theories  of  ethics,  252,  253. 

jury  service,  Tolstoy  refuses,  257. 


Kaloshin,  S6nichka,  61. 

Kaluga,  285. 

Kant,  139,  221,  231,  234,  253,  254, 

316. 
Kareyev,  181. 

Katk6v,  49,  134,  135,  142,  151. 
Kazan,    University   of,    9,    10,    13, 

72. 
Khayyam,  Omar,  210-212. 
Kingdom   of   God   Is  Within   You, 

298. 
Kolts6v,  109. 
Koni,  Senator,  306. 
K<yran,  92. 
Krapivo,  289. 
Kremlin,  Moscow,  86. 
Kreutzer  Sonata,  248,  306,  311-317, 

318,  321,  323,  348,  360. 
forbidden  in  mails,  313. 
Krishna,  231. 
Kropotkin,  65. 
Ksyunin,  226,  356. 
kumys  cure,  Tolstoy  takes,  81,  85, 

141, 148. 
Kutuzov,  161,  175,  176,  179. 


Lake,  Kirsopp,  244. 
land,  see  Tolstoy,  philosophy:  social, 
landed  gentry,  6,  54,  59,  84. 
"landed     proprietors'     literature," 

358. 
Lao-tsze,  231,  300. 
Last  Days  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy,  357. 
Leipzig,  72. 

Leonardo  da  Vinci,  336. 
Lermontov,  16,  21,  48,  49,  51. 
Les  MisSrables,  339. 
letter  box,  Tolstoy  family,  22,  281. ' 
letter  to  Tsar  Alexander  III,  257. 
letter  to  Tsar  Nicholas  II,  294. 


Letters,  see  Tolstoy,  Countess  Alex- 
andra Andreyevna,  Tolstoy, 
Countess  Sofya  Andreyevna, 
Biryukov,  Feinermann,  Fet, 
Rakhmanov,  Sergeyenko, 
Strakher,  Styka. 

Levochka,  133,  280-281. 

Liberals,  55,  56,  58,  64,  68,  78,  83, 
104,  125,  126,  134,  144,  152, 
184,  207,  293. 

liberty,  individual,  125. 

life,  philosophy  of,  see  Tolstoy, 
philosophy. 

Life  and  Conversations  of  L.  N. 
Tolstoy,  309. 

Life  of  a  Soldier's  Wife  (written  by 
two  boys),   113. 

Life  of  Tolstoy,  see  Biryuk6v  and 
Maude. 

Light  Shineth  in  Darkness,  see  And 
the  Light  Shineth  in  Darkness. 

Linen-Measurer,  130. 

literature,  position  of,  in  Russia, 
57-58. 

literature  for  peasants,  287. 

Little  Philip,  117-119. 

Little  Russia,  10. 

Living  Corpse,  306,  323. 

Living  Words  of  L.  N.  Tolstoy,  263, 
289. 

London,  72,  73,  145. 

Lovers  of  Russian  Literature,  So- 
ciety of,  68,  304. 

Love's  Labor's  Lost,  343,  352. 

Lucerne,  65. 

Lucretius,  6. 

lunatic  asylum,  see  Bulletin  of  the 
Patients  at  Yasnaya  Polyana 
Lunatic  Asylum. 

Lyly,  343. 

M 

Macaulay,  95. 

Macbeth,  184. 

Macbeth,  341. 

Maeterlinck,  338. 

Makary,  223. 

Makovitsky,  Doctor,  288,  355,  356. 


INDEX 


381 


Mdlikov,  288. 

Malory,  248. 

manor  life  in  Russia,  7,  160,  358. 

mare's  milk,  see  kumys  cure. 

Margaret  (Goethe's),  163. 

Marini,  343. 

marriage,   Tolstoy's   views  on,   62, 
311-312,  313. 

Marseilles,  72,  95,  96. 

Marx,  Karl,  274. 

Marx  (publisher),  290. 

Massachusetts  meeting  house,  334. 

Master  and  Man,  306,  308. 

Master  Spirits  of  Literature,   163, 
357. 

Maude  (Life  of  Tolstoy),  21,  22,  40, 
262,  278,  279,  293,  294,  295, 
299,  300,  317. 
{Tolstoy  and  His  Problems),  231, 
347. 

Maupassant,  247,  340,  346-348. 

meaning    of    life,    search    for,    see 
Tolstoy,  philosophy. 

Mediator,  287. 

Meditations,  360. 

merchant  class,  8. 

Merezhkovsky,   170. 

Merimee,   22. 

Messenger  of  Europe,  114,  293. 

metaphysics,  Tolstoy's  lack  of  in- 
terest in,  221,  254. 
see  also  Tolstoy,  philosophy. 

Metropolitan  Art  Museum,  335. 

Metropolitan  of  Moscow,  223. 

Michelangelo,  336. 

Milton,  13,  349,  363. 

Minnesota,   Bulletin  of  the  Univer- 
sity of,  352. 

Minor,  Rabbi,  268. 

Mohammedanism,  215. 

Moliere,    298,   308,   340,   343,   357, 
363. 

Molokane,  141,  226. 

monastery,  attempt  to  confine  Tol- 
stoy in,  295. 

monasticism,  285,  315. 

monologues,  309. 

Montaigne,  266. 


Monte  Cristo,  96. 

Montesquieu,  10. 

Montessori,  Madame,  122. 

moral  problems,  Tolstoy's  interest 

in,  16,  26,  32,  189,  201.  206- 

209,  306. 
see  also  Tolstoy,  philosophy. 
Moravin  Brethren,  364. 
Morning  of  a  Landed  Proprietor,  11, 

61,  78. 
Morozov,  Vaslly,  111,  114. 
Morte  Darthur,  248. 
Moscow,  7,  11,  34,  49,  62,  68,  82, 

84,    86,    89,    160,    169,    171, 

179,  192,  256,  263,  266,  272, 

280,  282,  287,  302,  304. 
Committee  of  Literacy,  89. 
Napoleon's    retreat    from,     160, 

187. 
Tolstoy's  life  in,  66,  267. 
Moscow  Gazette,  142. 
motherhood,  169-170,  273,  311. 
moving-picture  shows,  335. 
music,  22,  70,  348. 
musician,  incident  of,  65. 
My  Confession,  12,  15,  59,  64,  73, 

122,  139,  199,  205-218,  221, 

226,  229,  247,  360. 
prohibited  by  censor,  302. 
Turgenev's  impression  of,  302. 
My  Literary  Passions,  193. 
My  Religion,   222,    229,   230,    232, 

233,  237,  238,  239,  240,  241, 

251,  268,  298,  300,  305,  315, 

320,  361. 

N 

Napoleon,  4,  131,  160,  161,  175,  176, 

177,  179,  180,  181,  185,  187, 

275. 
Nationalists,    OflScial,    54,    55,    5Q, 

134. 
nationality,  55,  125,  126. 
Naturalists,  firench,  183. 
nature,  see  Tolstoy,  views  on. 
nature,     return    to,     see    Tolstoy, 

philosophy;  social. 


382 


INDEX 


Nekrasov,  24,  57,  76,  134. 

New  Primer,  88,  119. 

New  Testament,  108,  268. 

Newcome,  Colonel,  184. 

Nibelungs,  Song  of  the,  341. 

Nicholas  I,  54,  105. 

Nicholas  II,  294. 

nobility,  Russian,  6,  8,  54. 

Nobleman's  Nest,  75. 

Nogay,  51. 

non-resistance  to  evil,  see  Tolstoy, 
philosophy:  religious. 

Nouvelle  HSUnse,  16,  18,  19,  20.  ^ 

novelists'  influence  on  public  opin- 
ion, 57. 

"Numidian  cavalry,"  136. 


Odysseus,  353. 

Odyssey,  353. 

officers,  Russian,  39,  41,  43,  44,  45, 

46. 
Official    Nationalists,    54,    55,    56, 

134. 
Old  Testament,  108,  115,  237,  268. 
On  Life,  234,  236,  251,  333. 
On  Methods  of  Teaching  Reading,  90, 

98,  101. 
On  Non-Resistance  to  Evil  by  Evil, 

231,  250,  266. 
On  Popular  Education,  1862,  90,  92, 

93,  97,  98,  285. 
On  Popular  Education,  187 J,,  88,  89, 

90,  92,  98,  99,  100,  106. 
On  Shakespeare  and  the  Drama,  348- 

354. 
On  the  Census  in  Moscow,  269. 
On  the  Eve,  Tolstoy's  criticism  of,  75. 
On  the  Sex  Question,  316. 
On  the  Truth  in  Art,  305. 
On  Tolstoy  (comp.  Sergeyenko),  112, 

323,  371. 
Optin  Monastery,  285,  286,  356. 
Orthodox  Church,  15,  58,  143,  205, 

206,  216-219,  223-226,  256, 

285,  295-298. 
see  also  Tolstoy,  philosophy. 


orthodoxy,  55,  126. 

Ostrovsky,  57. 

Othello  (study  of,  by  Stoll),  352. 


paganism,  330. 
painting,  22. 
Panama  Canal,  180. 
Panayev,  57. 
Paradise  Lost,  341. 
Paris,  62,  63,  64,  72,  73. 
Pascal,  231. 

patriotism,  see  Tolstoy,  views  on. 
Patriotism  and  Government,  299. 
Patriotism  or  Peace,  299. 
peace,  Tolstoy  an  apostle  of  inter- 
national, 298. 
peasants,  7, 11, 19,  83, 187,  202,  340. 
and  the  land  question,  292,  293. 
illiteracy  of,  57,  187. 
literature  for,  287. 
school,  for,  11,  19,  72,  77,  81,  87, 

88,  89,  105,  106-120,  122. 
Tolstoy's  affection  for,  8,  126,  129. 
his  insight  into  their  life,  358. 
his  treatment  of,  78. 
his  peasant  drama,  308-311. 
see  also  common  people,  emanci- 
pation  movement,    serfdom, 
serfs, 
pedagogues,  100. 
pedagogy,  theories  of,  99. 
pessimism,  see  Tolstoy,  philosophy: 

religious. 
Peter  the  Great,  5,  148,  149,  225. 
Petulengro,  172. 

philosophy,  see  Tolstoy,  philosophy; 
also  War  and  Peace,  philos- 
ophy of  history. 
Pilgrim's  Progress,  342. 
Plato,    231,    234,    254,    300,    330, 

333,  360. 
Plutarch,  31. 
Poe,  277. 

poetry,  see  Tolstoy,  views  on. 
police    search    Tolstoy's    premises, 
82-84,  144. 


INDEX  383 

Polikushka,  74,  78, 134.  Proudhon,  73,  258. 

Turgenev's  estimate  of,  74.  Proverbs,   181. 

political   discussion   in   Russia,   54,  Psalter,  100. 

57-58,  77.  public  opinion  molded  by  novelists, 

political  parties  in  Russia,  54-56.  57-59. 

politics,    Tolstoy's   indifference   to,  Puritan  point  of  view,  253,  306,  313, 

45,  59,  64,  134,  152,  294.  334. 

Polonsky,  154,  302,  303.  of  Anna  Karenin,  189,  197-201. 

Pompey,  31.  Pushkin,  3,  5,  10,  16,  21,  48,  49, 

popular   schools,   government  plan  50,  57,   115,   119,   121,    147, 

for,    105.  149,  150,  159,  208,  340,  344. 

Port  Arthur,  fall  of,  299.  Puvis  de  Chavannes,  338. 
Postnikov,  F.  A.,  190. 

Potiphar's  wife,  344-345.  q 
"poverty,    chastity,  and    disobedi- 
ence," 315.  Quakers,  242,  321-322. 
Power  of  Darkness,  220,  248,  305, 

308-311,  360.  R 
Tolstoy's  account  of  writing,  309. 

Preface  to  Bdndarev's  Work,  251.  Radstock,  Lord,  321. 

Preface  to  the  Works  of  Guy  de  Mau-  railroads,  276. 

passant,  346-348.  Rakhmanov,    Tolstoy's   letters   to, 

Prescott,   16.  230,  300. 

Priam,  353.  Raphael,  336. 

Primer,  88,  90,  115,  116,  148,  152.  rationalist,  Tolstoy  a,  253,  316. 

Neiv  Primer,  88.  119.  Rayevsky,  282. 

printing  press,  276.  Readers,  88,  90,  115,  344. 

Prisoner  of  the  Caucasus  (Pushkin),  reading,  methods  of  teaching,  100. 

50.  realism,  Russian,  58. 

Prisoner  of  the  Caucasus  (Tolstoy),  see  also  Tolstoy,  literary  work. 

305,  344.  reason,  denial  of,  215,  216,  217.  221. 

prisons,  321.  Red  Laugh,  48. 

private  schools  prohibited,  105.  religion,  Tolstoy's  idea  of,  333. 

Prodigal  Son,  341.  religious  teachings  of  Tolstoy,   see 

progress,  critique  of,  Tolstoy's  re-  Tolstoy,  philosophy. 

jection  of  Liberals'  ideal  of.  Reminiscences  (Behrs),  131-132, 135, 

124-125.  137,  141,  148,  149,  246,  261, 

see  also  Tolstoy's  views  on  prog-  262-263. 

ress.  Reminiscences  of  Tolstoy  (Count  Ilya 

Progress  and  tJie  Definition  of  Educa-  Tolstoy),  20,  132-134,   136- 

tion,  90,  94,  95,  102.  138,   162,  255-256,  279-280, 

Project  of  a  General  Plan  for  Organ-  ^  280-281,  281-282,  285,  304. 

izing  Popular  Schools,  90, 105.  Renaissance,  330. 

property,   see  Tolstoy,   philosophy:  Repin's  portrait  of  Tolstoy,  278. 

social.  Reply  to  the  Holy  Synod,  296-298. 

prophet,  Tolstoy,  the  type  of,  363.  Republic,  360. 

Protestantism,  55.  Resurrection,    200,    248,    290,    294, 

Protestants,  218,  223.  30G,  319-323,  344. 


384 


INDEX 


copyright  of,  290. 
dramatization  of,  308. 
published  for  Dukhobors,  290. 

retreat  from  Moscow,  160,  187. 

return  to  nature,  see  Tolstoy,  philos- 
ophy: social. 

Revolutionists,  Tolstoy,  picture  of, 
294. 

Richard  the  Lion-hearted,  177. 

riddle  of  life,  221,  229,  247,  289. 
see  also  Tolstoy,  philosophy:  re- 
ligious. 

Riis,  Jacob,  269. 

Robbers,  16. 

Robinson  Crusoe,  342. 

"Robinson  Crusoe  life,"  279. 

Rolland,  232. 

on  Death  of  Ivdn  Ilyich,  307. 

.  on  War  and  Peace,  160. 

Roman  Catholics,  218,  223. 

Roman  Poets  of  the  Augustan  Age: 
Virgil,  6,  38,  194. 

Romeo  and  Juliet,  352. 

Rousseau,  16,  17-20,  21,  31,  34,  121, 
122,  124,  125,  126,  129,  231, 
246,  247,  276,  363. 

Rubinstein,  153. 

Rugby  Chapel,  347. 

Rurik,  5. 

Ruskin,  276. 

Russian  Church,  see  Orthodox 
Church. 

Russian  common  soldiers,  43,  44, 
45,  175. 

Russian  court,  64. 

Russian  life,  Tolstoy  describes  only,  4. 

Russian  literature,  position  of,  57- 
60. 

Russian  Literature  (Kropotkin),  65. 

Russian  Messenger,  134,  135,  151. 

Russian  nationality,  55,  125,  126. 

Russian  nobility,  68,  54. 

Russian  officers,  39, 41,  43, 44, 45,  46. 

Russian  political  parties,  54-56. 

Russian  realisn^,  58. 

see  also  Tolstoy,  literary  work. 

Russian  schools  of  political  thought, 
54i-5Q. 


Russian  sectarianism,  142. 
Russian  society,  6-8,  357. 
Russian  standards,  14,  199,  313. 
Russian  temperament,  14,  209,  358. 
Russky  Vestnik,   see  Russian  Mes- 
senger. 
Russo-Japanese  War,  299. 
Russo-Turkish  War,  1853,  11,  38. 
Russo-Turkish  War,  1877,  151,  218. 
Ryazan,  282. 
Ryleyev,  10. 

S 

St.  Paul,  241,  269,  311,  315. 

St.  Petersburg,  7,  10,  13,  39,  42,  56, 

65,  82,  83,  142,  148,  160,  166, 
_  192,  19G,  257,  268,  289. 
University  of,  10. 
Saladin,  177. 
Samara,  Province  of,  81,  141,  142, 

208,  260. 
T.  buys  estate  in,  142. 
Saxony,  Elector  of,  149. 
Scarlet  Letter,  34,  201. 
Schiller,  16,  336. 
schools,  Tolstoy  visits  French  and 

German,  72,  95-96. 
schools  for  peasants,  see  peasants, 

schools    for;    also    Yasnaya 

Polyana  School, 
schools     of     political     thought     in 

Russia,  54-56. 
Schools  of  Tomorrow,  122. 
Schopenhauer,   139,   152,  211,  213, 

247,  254. 
Schuyler,  Eugene,  159. 
Schweizerhof    hotel,    incident    with 

musician  at,  65. 
science,  see  Tolstoy,  views  on. 
Scott,  Sir  Walter,  47,  176,  177,  190. 
Scythians,  141. 
search    of    Tolstoy's    premises    by 

police,  82-84,  144. 
sectarianism,  142. 
sectarians,  141,  218,  226,  242,  268, 

275,  280,  289,  316,  358. 
see  also  dissenters, 
"see  through  with  love,"  159,  359. 


INDEX 


S85 


Self-dependence,  347. 

Sellar,  6,  37,  194. 

Semenov,  293. 

Sentimental  Journey,  16,  19,  23,  36. 

serfdom,  54,  58,  59,  78,  358. 

serfs,  7,  54,  77,  293. 
see  also  peasants. 

Sergeyenko,     How     Count     Tolstoy 
Lives  and  Works,  345. 
letters  collected  by,  150,  230,  262, 
284,  300,  311. 

Sermon  on  the  Mount,  16,  17,  237. 

Sevastopol,  61,  64,  71. 
siege  of,  22,  38. 

Sevastopol,  34, 38,  39-48, 66, 175, 197. 

sex  instinct,  see  Tolstoy,  views  on. 

Shakespeare,  185,  208,  308,  343, 
348-354,  357,  359,  361,  362, 
363. 

Shamil,  324. 

Shamordino  convent,  286,  356. 

Shaw,  352. 

Sherman,  General,  41. 

Short  Exposition  of  the  Gospel,  222. 

Siberia,  171,  286,  320. 

Sienkiewicz,  41,  176,  358. 

single  tax,  292-293. 

Skabichevsky,  152,  199. 

Slavophiles,  55,  5G,  68,  125,  126, 
149,  151,  152. 

Smoke,  Tolstoy's  estimate  of,  155. 

Snowstorm,  61,  308. 

social  doctrines  of  Tolstoy,  see  Tol- 
stoy, philosophy:  social. 

Socialists,  55,  56,  275,  276,  293,  294. 

society,  Russian,  see  Russian  society. 

Society  of  Friends,  see  Quakers. 

Society  of  Lovers  of  Russian  Litera- 
ture: 
T.'s  initiation  speech  before,  68. 
T.  accepts  invitation  to  speak  on 
Turgenev  before,  304. 

Socrates,  211,  231. 

Soden,  72,  73. 

soldiers,  common,  43-44,  45,  175. 

Solomon,  211,  212. 

So7ig  of  the  Nibelungs,  341. 

Speransky,  176,  185. 


Sportsman's  Sketches,  16. 

Starogladkovskaya,  11. 

Stary  Yurt,  11. 

Stendhal,  47. 

steppes,  141. 

Sterne,  16,  19,  21,  23,  25,  36. 

Stewardship  of  Faith,  244. 

Stoics,  361. 

Stoll,  Professor  F.  E.,  352. 

story  written  by  two  boys,  113. 

Strakhov,  Nikoldy,   150,   152,   156, 

194,  240,  358. 
Strunsky,   22,   227,   231,   236,   288, 

315,  318. 
Stundists,  226. 
Styka,  Jan,  232. 
suicide,  see  Tolstoy,  views  on. 
Sunday  newspapers,  334. 
Swedenborg,  362. 
"sweet  Auburn,"  310. 
Swift,  360. 
Swinburne,  342,  343. 
Switzerland,  64,  226,  287. 
Synod,  see  Holy  Synod. 
Sytin,  287. 
Syutayev,  268,  271,  273,  280. 


Taine,  157. 

Tale  of  Two  Cities,  339,  341. 

Talisman,  176. 

Talmud,  237. 

Tanya,  see  Behrs,  Tatyana. 

Tatyana,  "aunt,"  see  Ergolsky. 

taxation,    see   Tolstoy,   philosophy: 

social. 
Tchaykovsky,  see  Chaykovsky. 
teachers'  seminary,  89. 
teachings  of  Tolstoy,  see  Tolstoy, 

philosophy, 
teleological  theories  of  ethics,  252, 

253. 
Teneromo  {pseud,  for  Feinermann), 

263,  289,  309. 
Terek  (river),  51. 
text-books,  Tolstoy's  work  on,  88, 

90,  115,  116. 


386 


INDEX 


Thackeray,  35. 

theology,  Tolstoy's  lack  of  interest 
in,  221,  !223. 
see     also     Tolstoy,     philosophy: 
religious. 

Thiosophe,  232. 

Thoughts  on  Education  and  Instruc- 
tion, 123. 

Thoughts  on  God,  62,  356. 

Three  Deaths,  66,  131. 

T.'s  ovm  criticism  on,  66-67. 

Three  Musketeers,  96. 

Tikhon  and  Melanya,  37. 

To  the  Working  People,  293. 

Topffer,  25,  36. 

Tolstoy,  Countess  Alexandra  An- 
dreyevna  (father's  cousin), 
15,  16,  20,  64,  66,  70,  75,  77, 

81,  82,  85,  87,  106,  115,  129, 
134,  142,  144,  146,  147,  148, 
236,  256,  295. 

her  impressions  of  Tolstoy,    15, 
64-65,  256-257. 
Tolstoy,    Alexandra    (daughter    of 

L.  N.),  356. 
Tolstoy,  Dmitry  (Mitenka)  (brother 

of  L.  N.),  6,  14,  364. 
Tolstoy,  Count  llya  (grandfather  of 

L.  N.),  5,  161. 
Tolstoy,  Count  llya  (son  of  L.  N.), 
20,    132-134,    136-138,    162, 
255,  279,  280,  282,  283,  285. 
Tolstoy,    Count    Leo    (Lev    Niko- 
layevich). 
anarchism,  see  philosophy:  social, 
ancestors,  5,  148,  161-162. 
arbiter  of  the  peace,  77,  79,  81, 

82,  87. 
arrest,  145. 

art  criticism,  see  views  on  esthetics; 
and  What  is  Art? 

asceticism,  see  philosophy:  re- 
ligious. 

attitude  towards: 

church    and    state,    245,    246, 

319. 
Contemporary  group,  59-61. 


courts   of   law,    136,    145-147, 

239,  321. 
government,    82,    83,    104-105, 
197,    202,    272,    273,    293, 
294,  295,  321. 
Liberals,  56,  59,  61,  64,  68,  78, 
83,  104,  124,  126,  144,  207. 
293,  294. 
literary  men,  60,  61,  277. 

see  also  quarrel  with  Turgenev. 

Nationalists,  56,  134. 

political   parties,    see   Liberals, 

Nationalists,  Socialists, 

Slavophiles. 

politics,  45,  59,  64,   134,   152, 

294. 
Slavophiles,  56,  126,  149. 
Socialists,  5Q,  293,  294. 
authorship,  first  plans  for,  23. 
autobiographical    elements    in 
works,  5,   23,   25,  48,   61, 
62,   65,   85,   80,   116,   161, 
186,    201,    202,    205,    217, 
222,  240,  266,  268. 
bear  hunt,  70-71,  116. 
birth,  6. 

book-keeping  methods,  285. 
burial,  357,  365. 

conflict  between  life  and  ideals, 
36-37,   60,   241,   ±55,   257, 
259, 261, 264,  265,  279,  282, 
283-284,    290,    293,    355, 
364. 
conversion,  7,  21,  56,  71,  77,  89, 
152,    205-217,    219,    236, 
246,    248,    255,    257,    258, 
259,    287,    300,    302,    306, 
310,  315,  320. 
creed,   296-298. 
death,  357. 

defends  private  soldier,  135. 
didactic  writings,  see  educational 

writings, 
disciples,  see  Tolstoyans. 
divides  his  estate,  261-262. 
education  of,  6,  8,  9,  10. 
educational  writings,  list  of,  90. 
see  also  views  on  education. 


INDEX 


ssr 


esthetics,  see  views  on  esthetics, 
ethical  teachings,  see  philosophy, 
"excommunication,"  226,  295. 
family,    see   Tolstoy,    Alexandra, 
Dmitry,  etc.;  also  Ergolsky, 
Tatyana,    and    Volkonsky 
family, 
family  life,  85,  158,  161.       ' 
home  life  before  marriage,  69. 
early  married  life,  128-130. 
letter  box,  22,  281. 
Count  Ilya's  account  of,  136- 

138,  255-256. 
friction  caused  by  his  religious 
views,  255,  261-265,  355. 
famine  relief  work,  106,  142-143, 

282-285,  287,  298. 
farming  interests,   71,   135,   207, 

260. 
father,  see  Tolstoy,  Nikolay. 
field  labors,  277-278. 
financial  success  of  literary  work, 

24,  134,  207,  290. 
flight  from  home,  240,  263,  288. 
letter  to  wife  about,  355-356. 
earlier  letter  to  wife,  264-265. 
gambling  debts,  15,  49. 
grandfather  (maternal),  162. 
Greek  studies,  140,  141,  227. 
habits  of  work,  9,  131-134. 
handwriting,  133. 
Hebrew  studies,  268. 
home  life,  see  family  life, 
individualism,  see  philosophy, 
influence     of     Dickens,     Henry 
George,    Rousseau,    Scho- 
penhauer, Stendhal,  Topf- 
fer,    Turgenev,    see    those 
names. 
journeys: 

first  western,  62-65,  76. 

second  western,  72-73. 

to  Samara,  81,  140-143. 

to  Ryazan,  282. 

to  Optin  Monastery,  285-286, 

356. 
last  journey,  240,  263,  266,  288, 
355-357. 


last  illness,  356-357. 

last  journey,  see  journeys. 

letter  to  Tsar  Alexander  III,  257. 

letter  to  Tsar  Nicholas  II,  294. 

literary  ideals,  114. 

literary  temperament,  lack  of,  21. 

literary  work,  characteristics  of: 
burning  indignation,  360. 
clearness    of    expression,    346, 

348. 
concentration,  see  unity, 
conversation,  treatment  of,  308. 
describes  only  Russian  life,  4. 
detail,  power  over  concrete,  26, 

29,  40,  189,  309,  344. 
directness,  52,  140. 
duality  of  his  literary  genius, 

189,  201. 
formlessness,  see  neglect  of  con- 
ventional technique, 
frankness  of  speech,  313,  321. 
*'high  seriousness,"  37. 
humor,  224,  319. 
idealism,  183. 
independence,  47,  359. 
individuality,  346,  358. 
insight  into  human  nature,  321, 

358,  359,  361. 
moral  fervor,  178,  358,  361. 
moral  point  of  view,  16,  26,  32, 

189,    201,    306,    348,    349, 

352,  360. 
natural  scenery,  treatment  of, 

26-27,  49-52. 
neglect   of   conventional    tech- 
nique, 4,  21,  158-159,  189, 

191,  193,  359. 
neglect  of  style,  21,  347. 
observation,   truth  of,   26,   29, 

174,  175,  192,  305. 
pessimism,  211,  248,  306. 

see  also  philosophy:  religious, 
plot  interest  secondary,  25. 
plots  based  on  real  events,  25, 

48,  62,  65,  150. 
psychological  analysis,  26,  30, 

41-43,  47,  63,  174,  309. 


388 


INDEX 


Puritan  point  of  view,  189,  197- 

201,  253,  306. 
realism,  4,  25,  30,  51-52,  183, 

201,  308,    344,    348,    351, 
354,  359,  360. 

restraint,  41. 

rhetorical  devices  avoided,  346. 
simplicity,  52, 140,  344, 346, 354. 
sincerity,  32,  33,  44,  302,  346, 

352. 
somber  tone  of  later  work,  306. 
suggestion,  191. 
supernatural  elements  in  stories, 

304-305,  345. 
unity: 

of  Death  of  Ivdn  Ilyich,  307. 
lack  of,  in  War  and  Peace,  158. 
degree  of,  in  Anna  Karenin, 
189-190. 
unromantic  tone,  4,  49. 
love  affairs,  48,  61-62,  63,  85-86. 
marriage,  86,  87,  88,  207. 
military   service,    10,    11,   38-39. 

46,  197,  299. 
moral  authority,  290. 
mother,  see  Tolstoy,  Marya. 
move  to  England  contemplated, 

145-146. 
move  to  Moscow,  267. 
old  age,  300. 
pessimism,  see  literary  work,  and 

philosophy:  religious, 
petitions  Tsar  Alexander  II,  84. 

philosophy:   religious   and 

ETHICAL 

Tolstoy's  religious  nature: 
an  intuitionalist  and  emotion- 
alist, 19,  327,  340. 
his  search  for  truth,  9,  14,  45, 

202,  207,    208,    216,    219, 
227,  256,  297,  300,  360,  364. 

his  interest  in  moral  prob- 
lems, 16,  26,  32,  45,  46, 184, 
189, 196,  201,  277,  344,  356. 

his  questionings  on  the  mean- 
ing of  life,  207-210,  213, 
214,  221,  229,  235,  289. 


his  criticism  of  manual  of 
theology,  219,  223,  226. 

his  study  of  the  gospels,  219- 
231. 

his  development  of  a  religious 
philosophy  of  life,  46-47, 
121, 122, 123,  161,  204,  219, 
221,  222-242,  245,  255,  259. 

his  relations  to  Orthodox  Church: 
early  faith,  15,  205. 
loss  of  faith,  15,  205. 
questionings,  207-217. 
study  of  religions,  215. 
return     to     faith     and     the 

Church,  216. 
abandonment  of  Church,  218, 

219. 
denunciation  of  Church,  224- 

226. 
"excommunication,"        226, 

295. 

kis  ethical  teachings: 

against  taking  oaths,  238-239. 
asceticism,  140,  201,  241,  245, 

248-250,    251,    254,    277, 

284,  311,  314,  316. 

condemnation  of,  249-250, 
301. 
Christian  anarchy,  124,  127, 

274,  361. 
dislike  of  civilization,  19,  65, 

95,  121,  124,  245,  246-247, 

275. 
dual  nature  of  human  life, 

234. 
five  commandments,  238,  251, 

320. 
•  inborn    excellence    of    lowly 

people,  36,  43,  56,  96,  104, 

119, 121, 187-188,  214,  215, 

219-220,  242.  307,  335-336. 
individualism,  45,  46,  56,  59, 

84,  122,  125,  126,  127,  170, 

183,  228,  245,  275,  288,  358. 
love,  139,  146,  188,  245,  250- 

252,  254,  284.  301. 


INDEX 


of  enemies,  229-230. 

of  God,  231,  251,  339. 

of  one's  neighbor  (all  men), 
231,  238,  251,  339. 

brotherly  love,  4,  17,  218, 
278,  297. 
non-resistance  to  evil,  17, 123, 

127,    188,    237,    238,    242, 

300,  316,  361. 
pessimism,  139,  211-213,  245, 

247,  248. 
physical    labor    a    cure    for 

spiritual  ills,  202,  240,  273, 

277-278.  ^ 
pious  mendicancy,  240,  249, 

273. 
renunciation  of  animal  per- 
sonality, 234-235,  249,  251- 

252    316. 
self-sacrifice,   127,   248,   250, 

254,  277. 
service  of  others,   127,  250, 

254. 
universal  forgiveness,  17. 

his  views  on: 

ceremonies     (religious),     see 

sacraments  and  ceremonies. 
Christ,  15,  206,  217,  223,  227, 

228,  230,  231,  233,  296. 
Church  practices,  218. 
communion,    216,    217,    225, 

226. 
confession,  15,  217. 
death,   34,  66-67,   131,  215, 

233,  236,  298. 
dogmas,  16,  34. 
faith,  214,  217,  220,  232. 
fasting,  216. 
God,  15,  34,  68,  206,  214,  221. 

227,  229,  232,  233,  236,  242, 

296. 
immortality,  15-16,  34,  213, 

232-237.  242,  316. 
infallibility  of  Jesus,  227. 
miracles,  223,  228. 
prayer,  15,  83,  216,  225,  296, 

297, 


redemption,  223. 
relics,  worship  of,  216. 
resurrection,  223,  228. 
revelation,  68. 

sacraments   and   ceremonies, 
143,  216,  217,  218,  235,  321. 
salvation  by  faith,  223. 
Trinity,  214,  223,  296. 

philosophy:   social 
general  characteristics: 

anarchistic     tendencies,     56, 
127,  238-239,  241,  273,  274, 
282,  293,  294. 
individualism,  126,  275. 
premises  unsound,  277. 
reactionary  character  of  his 
remedies,  276. 

teachings: 
communal     organization     of 

land  property,  258. 
duty  of  child-bearing,  273. 
idle   rich   cause   of   poverty, 

272. 
labor  the  cure  for  social  ills, 

249,  271-272,  277. 
return  to  nature,  245,  246- 

247,  273,  275-277. 
true  charity,  271-272. 

views  on: 

almsgiving,  269,  270, 278,  283. 
charitable  organizations,  269, 

272. 
factories,  272. 
land,  258,  292-293. 
money,   251,  266,  272,  273. 

284,  290. 
poverty,  267,  269,  272,  273. 
property,  239,  249,  251,  257- 

266. 
prostitution,  270-271. 
single  tax,  292-293. 
slum  conditions,  267, 269-272. 
taxation,  19,  272,  274. 
philosophy  of  history,  see  War  and 

Peace, 


390 


INDEX 


pilgrimages  to  Optin  Monastery, 

285-280. 
place  in  world  literature,  3,  163, 

357-363. 
plans  to  expatriate  himself,  84, 

145-146. 
plowing,  278. 
portrait,  by  Repin,  278. 
property    (his    own),    144,    145, 

261-262. 
proposes  to  Sofya  Behrs,  85. 
quarrel  with  Turgenev,  74-77, 154. 
readmg,  16-18,  20,  139. 
refuses  jury  service,  257. 
religious  teachings,  see  philosophy, 
reply  to  Bellows,  322-323. 
reply  to  Holy  Synod,  296-298. 
search  of  premises  by  police,  82- 

84,  144. 
shoe-making,  266,  278. 
social  doctrines,  see  philosophy, 
social  station,  5,  7,  36,  59,  126, 

137, 141,  144,  241,  251,  280. 
student    at    Kazan    University, 

9-10. 
teachings,  see  philosophy. 

temperament   and    personal    char- 
acteristics: 
appearance,  64-65. 
aristocratic  tendencies,  5,  6,  36, 
59,  126,  137,  141,  146,  241, 
251,  280-281,  358. 
aspirations   for   self-perfection, 
12-13,  32-33, 123,  206,  245. 
see  also  philosophy, 
boyhood  traits,  9. 
brotherly  personality,  358. 
business  capacity,  71,  79,  106, 
135,  259-262,  282-283,  285. 
common  sense,  106,  283. 
consistency,  122,  223. 

lack  of,  289. 
democratic  sympathies,  36, 141, 

223,  251,  280,  315. 
dislike  of  city  life,  18. 

of  doctors  and  medicine,  19. 
of  merchant  class,  8, 


of  organization  (public  ac- 
tivity), 56,  104,  176,  182. 
186,  245,  282,  283-284,  288, 
289. 
of  outward  manifestations  of 
feeling,  20,  138. 

dissipated  early  life,  11,  13-14, 
46,  60,  128. 
his  account  of,  in  My  Con- 
fessions,  206. 

dreams  of  childhood,  33,  301. 

dress,  see  manners  and  dress. 

duality  of  his  nature,  26,  67,  68, 
140,  189,  201. 

emotional  side  of  his  nature,  20, 
250. 

enthusiastic  interest  in  life,  26, 
66,  248,  306. 

gaiety,  64,  255,  281,  318,  319. 

hasty   temper,   76,    80,    82-84, 
132,  146,  147,  157. 

hatred  of  compromise,  4. 
of  vanity,  35,  39. 

high  breeding,  202. 

honesty,  39,  65,  86. 

idealism,  106,  183. 

impetuosity,   158. 

individualism,  see  philosophy. 

industry,  131-132. 

introspectiveness,    see    love    of 
self -analysis. 

irritability,  147,  255. 

jealousy  of  personal  liberty,  82- 

84,  144-147. 
kindliness,   77,   251,   257,   280, 

358. 
literal-mindedness,  230. 
love  of  admiration,  278. 
of  beauty,  325. 
of  children,  111-112, 128-130. 
of  country  life,  11, 18,  26,  202, 

261,  273,  275. 
of  family  life,  18,  21,  61,  69, 

85,  128-130,  161,  190,  240- 
241,  251,  259,  311. 

of  flowers,  142,  325,  332. 
of  peasants,  8,  126,  129,  267- 
268. 


INDEX 


391 


of  self-analysis,  20,  26,  8G. 
loyalty  to  tsar,  50,  84,  126,  197, 

257,  293. 

man  of  society,  66,  73. 
manners  and  dress,  18,  59,  66, 

73. 
many-sidedness,  3,  310. 
meditative  temperament,  26,  32, 

208,  250. 
moral  aspirations,  12,  16,  26,  32, 

33,  37,  206,  363,  364. 
see  also  philosophy, 
moral   fervor,    178,    269,    349. 

358,  361. 
moral  insight,  361. 
passionate  nature,  61,  250. 
personal  magnetism,  141,  202. 
personality  (general): 

description  of,  by  Countess 

Alexandra  Tolstoy,  64-65. 
description  of,  by  Chaykov- 

sky,  153-154. 
description  of,  by  son  Ilya, 

137-138,  255-256. 
description  of,  by  self,  281- 

282. 
pride  of  birth,  see  aristocratic 

tendencies, 
prone  to  tears,  20. 
pugnaciousness,  250. 
religious  nature,  46. 

see  also  philosophy, 
restlessness,  63. 
revolutionary  tendencies,  4,  84, 

258,  358. 

sincerity,  18,  26,  32,  33,  35-37. 

44,  255,  289,  302. 
spirit  of  contradiction,  59,  77, 

106,  245,  291,  348. 
sympathy,  141,  197. 
truthfulness,  9,  30-33,  36,  40, 

44,    45,    65,    79,    86,    130, 

155-156,  206,  270-271,  278, 

302. 
typically  Russian,  4,  258. 
unconventionality,  66. 
vanity,  9,  17,  35,  278. 
vegetarianism,  279. 


tews  on: 
art,  see  esthetics, 
authorship,  207. 
autocracy,  126,  293-294. 
beauty,  see  esthetics, 
capital  punishment,  218. 
celibacy,  311,  313,  315. 
civilization,  19,  65,  95,  121,  124, 

245,  246-247,  275. 
communal  life,  289. 
education,  11,  19,  72,  87-127. 
aims,  99,  102,  103,  108. 
cardinal  questions,  98. 
compulsion  condemned,  90- 

98,  108,  123. 
condemnation  of  modem  prin- 
ciples, 90. 
definition,  101-102. 
discipline  and  order,  99,  107- 

111,  124. 
example  of  teacher,  123. 
experience  the  teacher,  98. 
false  aims,  99,  103. 
freedom  the  criterion,  98,  99, 

108-110. 
individualism,  122,  126-127. 
methods,  99-101. 
peasant  schools,  11,   19,  72, 
77,  81,  87,  88,  89,  106-120. 
pedagogues    and    pedagogy, 

100. 
programs,  92,  95,  99,  110. 
religious  sanction,  92,  95, 123. 
rewards    and    punishments, 

111. 
Rousseau's     influence,     121, 

122,  124,  125,  126. 
school  of  life,  95-97. 
teachers,  100,  101,  106,  107, 

108,  110. 
teaching  of: 

arithmetic,  95,  99,  110. 
art,   119. 
botany,  107. 
composition,  113-114. 
see  also  Who  is  to  Teach 
the  Art  of  Writing? 
drawing,  107, 


392 


INDEX 


grammar,  110,  112-113. 
literature,  115. 
music,  107,  120,  122. 
reading,  98,  100-101. 
religion,  107-108. 
sacred  history,  110. 
singing,  107,  122. 
surveying,  107. 
tendencies,  modem,  93. 
works  on  (by  Tolstoy),  90. 
emancipation   of   serfs,    77-79, 

126. 
esthetic,  119-122. 

beauty    an    unessential    ele- 
ment, 32. 
enjoyment  of  art  a  natural 

need,  119-120. 
exclusive    tendency    of    art, 

120,  121. 
masses  more  capable  of  right 

judgment,  119. 
popular,  infectious  character 

of  art,  325. 
preference  for  popular  stand- 
ards, 119^121. 
Rousseau's  influence,  121. 
true    science  and   art,   331- 

332. 
truth  of  moral  ideas  funda- 
mental, 305. 
understanding  of  the  beauti- 
ful, 119. 

see    also    What    is    Art?, 
On  Shakespeare  and  the 
Drama,   and   Preface   to 
the    Works    of    Guy    de 
Maupassant. 
force,  see  violence, 
land  property,  see  property, 
marriage,  62,  311-312,  313. 
military  service,  289-290,  298. 
motherhood,  169-170,  273,  311. 
music,  22,  70,  348. 
nature,  26,  49-52,  70,  236-237. 
painting,  22. 

patriotism,  39,  151,  246,  299. 
poetry,  22,  32,  38,  347. 
prisons,  321. 


progress,  56,  64,  73,  81,  93-95, 
101,    124,    125,    182,    184, 
207,  275,  276,  292. 
public  activity    (organization), 
56,  104,  176,  182,  186,  245, 
282,  283,  288,  289. 
science,  19,  209-210,  331-332. 
sex  instinct,  190,  238,  270,  313- 

318. 
suicide,  208,  213,  214,  248,  316. 
taxation  of  peasants,  19,  272, 

274. 
university  training,  9-10,  103, 

104. 
vanity,  35,  39,  43,  44. 
violence,  64,  98,  102,  123,  127, 
136,  238,  239,  246,  257,  295, 
300,  316,  361. 
•war,    40-41,    47-48,    151,    197, 

218,  239,  246,  298,  299. 
women,  212,  262,  311,  317-318. 
visited  by  Turgenev,  156. 
visits  Turgenev,  302. 
wealth,  see  property  (his  own), 
wideness  of  his  influence,  3-4,  48, 

357-359. 
wife,  see  Tolstoy,  Countess  Sofya 

Andreyevna. 
works: 

see  Albert,  And  the  Light  Shineth 
in  Darkness,  Anna  Karenin, 
Bethink  Yourselves,  Bulletin 
of  the  Patients  at  Yasnaya 
Polyana  Lunatic  Asylum, 
Childhood,  Boyhood  and  Youth, 
Christianity  and  Patriotism, 
Cossacks,  Course  of  Reading, 
Critique  of  Dogmatic  Theol- 
ogy, Death  of  Ivdn  Ilyich, 
Decembrists,  Devil,  Diary, 
Education  and  Culture,  Epi- 
logue to  the  Kreutzer  Sonata, 
Esarhaddon,  Family  Happi- 
ness, Father  Sergy,  Fruits  of 
Enlightenment,  God  Sees  the 
Truth,  Hadji  Murad,  Har- 
mony and  Translation  of  the 
Four      Gospels,      Holstomer 


INDEX  393 

(Linen-Measurer),  Idyl,  In-  Tolstoy,  Mikhail  (son  of  L.  N.),  323. 
cursion.  Journal  (Diary),  Tolstoy,  Nikolay  (father  of  L.  N.), 
Kingdom   of  God  is   Within  5,  161. 

You,  Kreutzer  Sonata,  Linen-  Tolstoy,  Nikolay  (Nikolenka) 
Measurer,  Little  Philip,  Liv-  (brother  of  L.  N.),  6,  11,  72, 

ing  Corpse,  Lucerne,  Master  73,  364,  365. 

and    Man,     Morning    of    a   Tolstoy,  Peter,  5. 
Landed  Proprietor,  My  Con-   Tolstoy,  Sergey  (Serezha)  (brother 
fession.    My    Religion,    New  of  L.  N.),  6,  13,  86,  280,  364. 

Primer,  On  Life,  On  Methods  Tolstoy,  Sergey  (son  of  L.  N.),  149, 
of  Teaching  Reading,  On  Non-  266. 

Resistance  to  Evil,  On  Popular  Tolstoy,  Countess  Sofya  Andrey- 
Education,  1862,  On  Popular  evna   (Sonya),   85,    86,    128, 

Education,  187It,   On   Shake-  129,  132,  135,  145,  148,  149, 

speare  and    the    Drama,    On  157,  159,  161,  162,  226,  236, 

the   Census   in   Moscow,    On  237,  240,  250,  260,  261,  262, 

the  Truth  in  AH,  Patriotism  263,  264,  265,  266,  279,  282, 

and    Government,    Patriotism  285,  293,  301,  304,  311,  313, 

and  Peace,  Polikushka,  Power  323,  324,  348,  355,  356. 

of  Darkness,  Preface  to  Bon-  acts  as  secretary  for  her  husband, 
darev's  Work,  Preface  to  the  132-134. 

Works  of  Guy  de  Maupassant,       character,  128. 
Primer,  Prisoner  of  the  Cau-       her  lack  of  sympathy  with  Tol- 
ca^us.  Progress  and  the  Defini-  stoy's   views,    128,    261-265, 

tion  of  Education,  Project  of  a  355. 

General  Plan  for  Organizing       marriage,  86. 
Popular     Schools,      Readers,       Tolstoy's  parting  letters  to,  264- 
Reply    to    the    Holy    Synod,  265,  355-356. 

Resurrection,  Sevastopol,  Short  Tolstoy,  Tatyana  (daughter  of  L. 
Exposition     of    the     Gospel,  N.),  356. 

Snowstorm,  Thoughts  on  Edu-    Tolstoy  and  Dostoyevsky,  170. 
cation        and        Instruction,    Tolstoy  and  His  Problems,  231,  347. 
Thoughts     on     God,      Three  Tolstoy  communities,  287-289. 
Deaths,  Tikhon  and  Melanya,   Tolstoy  family,  5-6,  161. 
To  the  Working  People,  Two   Tolstoy anism,  288. 
Hussars,     War    and    Peace,   Tolstoyans,  278-279,  287,  289,  291. 
What  is  Art?,  What  Men  Live   Tolstoyites,  see  Tolstoyans. 
By,  What  Shall  We  Do  Then?,    Tolstoy's  ''War  and  Peace''  from  a 
Who  is  to  Teach  the  Art  of  Military  Point  of  View,  179. 

Writing?,    Why    People    Be-    Tom  Sawyer,  342. 
come     Intoxicated,     Yasnaya   tragedy,  see  Power  of  Darkness. 
Polyana   (Journat),   Yasnaya   Trans-Siberian  railway,   180. 
Polyana   School,    Year  1805,   translation  of  Tolstoy,  847. 
Youth.  translations  of  Tolstoy,  4,  155,  157, 

Tolstoy,  Marya  (mother  of  L.  N.),  290. 

5,  6,  161,  162.  tribute  of  Tolstoy's  pupil,  111-112. 
Tolstoy,  Marya   (sister  of  L.  N.),    truth,  Tolstoy's  search  for,  see  Tol- 

6,  14,  69,  72,  286,  356.  stoy,  philosophy:  religious. 


394 


INDEX 


Truth  the  hero  of  Sevastopol,  45. 
Tschaikowsky,  see  Chaykovsky. 
Tsinger,  323. 
Tula,  6,  79,  114,  308. 
Turgenev,   3,    16,   57,    59,    63,   66, 
77,   155,  156,  157.  209,  346, 
358. 
admiration  for  Tolstoy,  74,  154, 

302,  303. 
death-bed  appeal  to  Tolstoy,  303. 
influence  on  Tolstoy,  16,  66. 
quarrel  with  Tolstoy,  74-77. 
reconciliation,  154. 
Tolstoy's  estimate ^of,  75-76,  155. 
Tolstoy's    projected    speech    on, 

304. 
visited  by  Tolstoy,  302. 
visits  Tolstoy,  156. 
Turkey,  war  with,  see  Russo-Turk- 

ish  war. 
Tver  provincial  council,  294. 
Twain,  Mark,  58. 
Two  Hussars,  37,  61. 


U 


Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,  340,  341. 
Unitarians,  227. 
United  States,  55,  105,  335. 
"university  in  bast  shoes,"  89. 
university    training,     see    Tolstoy, 
views  on. 


V.  A.,  61-62. 
Vanity  Fair,  35. 
Vanka  the  Steward,  119. 
Vengerov,  89. 
Venus  of  Milo,  119,  342. 
Verigin,  289,  291,  292. 

Tolstoy's  letter  to,  291-292. 
Verlaine,  336. 
Veroii,  327. 

Vinci,  Leonardo  da.,  336. 
violence,  see  Tolstoy,  views  on. 
Virgil,  185,  357. 
VirgU  (Sellar's),  6,  38,  194. 


Volkonsky,  Princess  Marya,  see  Tol- 
stoy, Marya  (mother  ofL.N.). 
Volkonsky  family,  5-6,  162. 

W 

Wagner,  338. 

war,  see  Tolstoy,  views  on. 
War  and  Peace,  5,  7,  18,  26,  69,  88, 
129,  131,  132.  134,  135,  139, 
143,  148,  152,  154,  157,  158- 
18§,  190,  191,  193,  \m,'Wl, 
245,  247,  305,  306,  321,  345, 
349,  359,  360. 

Merezhkovsky's  estimate  of,  170. 

Holland's  estimate  of,  160. 

Tolstoy's  own  estimate  of,  159. 

Turgenev's  estimate  of,  154. 

elements  of,  160. 

Homeric  spirit  of,  160. 

superficial  lack  of  unity  of,  158. 

wolf-hunt  in,  1J2. 

philosophy  of  history  in,  131,  161, 
175-184,  245. 
determinism,  182,  184. 
duality  of  human  nature,  180, 

181,  182. 
fatalism,  180,  183. 
fixity  of  human  nature,  180. 
free  will,  182,  184. 
"swarm  life,"  181,  182. 
Tolstoy's  lack   of   historic   in- 
terest,  183. 

see  also,  under  characters  in 
Tolstoy  s  novels:  Bezukhov, 
Bolkonsky,  Denisov,  Kara- 
tayev,  Kuragin,  Oblonsky, 
Rostov,  Sonya. 
Washington,  George,  185. 
Waterloo,  47. 
Way  of  Martha  and  the  Way  of  Mary, 

34. 
Western    culture    versus    Russian 

nationality,  125. 
What  is  Art?,  121,  ^Q5,,^mScM&> 
art  the  conscious  transfer  of  emo- 
tion, 326-327,  329,  337,  339, 
344.  347. 


INDEX 


395 


beauty    an    unessential    element, 

325,  326,  327. 
eleamess,  346. 
condemnation  of  esthetic  theories, 

326,  330. 
condemnation  of  four  methods  of 

producing  art,  336-338,  345- 
346. 
condemnation  of  modem  art,  331, 
332,  334. 

artificial  and  obscure,  335,  336. 

errotic,  335. 

essentially  bad,  121. 

exclusive,  334-335,  340,  341. 

imitation  of  pagan  art,  330. 

insincere,  335,  336. 

irreligious,  333-334. 

pandering  to  craving  for  enjoy- 
ment, 336-337. 

poor  in  content,  335,  336,  340. 
definition   of  art,   326-327,   328, 

340,  345. 

essentials  of  good  art,  325-340. 
infectiousness,    325,    326,    327, 

328,  336-337,  338,  340. 
religious  point  of   view,   328- 

334,  339-340. 
Good,  Beautiful,  True,  330-331. 
individuality,  346. 
ornaments,  327-328. 
sincerity,  336,  346. 
Tolstoy's  esthetics  a  corollary  of 

his  ethics,  326,  329,  339,  340, 

341,  345. 

Tolstoy's  estimate  of  his  own  ar- 
tistic work,  305,  344. 
universality,  325,  339,  340,  341, 
345. 
see  also  Tolstoy,  views  on  esthet- 
ics. 
What  Men  Live  By,  305. 
What  Shall  We  Do  Then?,  183,  200, 
240,  246,  267-277,  288,  298, 
305,  311,  331,  341,  361. 
see  al-90  Tolstoy,  philosophy :  social. 


Who  is  to  Teach  the  Art  of  Writing: 
We  to  the  Peasant  Children,  or 
.  the  Peasant  Children  to  Us?, 
90,  103,  113. 

Why  People  Become  Intoxicated,  184. 

Widow  in  the  Bye  Street,  310. 

Wiener,  62. 

wolf-hunt,  see  War  and  Peace. 

women,  see  Tolstoy,  views  on. 

Wordsworth,  26. 

working  classes,  see  common  people. 

world-affirming  ethic,  243-244,  274. 

world-renouncing  ethic,  243,  244, 
254,  274. 


Xenophon,  140. 


Yakuts,  328. 

Yasnaya  Polyana,  6,  11,  65,  66, 
71,  82,-  83,  86,  88,  98,  106, 

112,  135,  144,  260,  263,  278, 
285. 

Tolstoy's  plan  for  Christian  farm- 
ing at,  11,  260-261. 
Yasnaya  Polyana  (journal),  88,  89, 

90,  105. 
Yasnaya   Polyana   School,   11,   19, 
82,  87,  88,  89,  98,  106-120. 
described   by   Tolstoy,    106-111, 

113,  119-120. 
described  by  pupil,  111,  112. 

Yasnaya  Polyana  School  in  Novem- 
ber and  December,  1861,  90, 
108,  110,  113,  120,  326. 

Year  1805  {War  and  Peace),  134. 

Youth,  see  Childhood,  Boyhood  and 
Youth. 


zemesivo,  89. 


THT^.  END 


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